


Before our spring.

by JessKyuCriss



Category: Banana Fish (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - College/University, Diary/Journal, E-mail, Eiji and Ash are teachers, Epistolary, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Photographer Okumura Eiji, Protective Ash Lynx, Psychological Trauma, Slow Burn, Slow Romance, Therapy, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, professor Callenreese
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-04
Updated: 2019-11-10
Packaged: 2020-01-04 19:49:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 64
Words: 88,894
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18350510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JessKyuCriss/pseuds/JessKyuCriss
Summary: Aslan Jade Callenreese is a famous writer and professor at the University of New York who hides  a dark story behind his facade. After he met the new exchange photography proffesor, something about that dark past comes back to him so he decides to countinue the therapy treatment he had ended before. His therapist advises him to write a diary to deal with his demons in a better way and he decides to write a series of e-mails to his best friend Shorter Wong in which he will heal his heart and get it ready to make spring bloom again in him...





	1. Subject: I´ll take you as my journal because I hate you and you love me.

_“I know this sounds foolish_ _but I’m afraid to go to you._  
Even if you don’t understand it’s alright, it’s alright.  
Because there’s still a lot of time before spring will come. _”_

**_Before our spring, Jonghyun._ **

* * *

 

****

**From: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**To: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**Subject: I´ll take you as my journal because I hate you and you love me.**

Do you think therapists have a class where they learnt how to be completely ridiculous?

Truth be told, I have not asked mine yet but now I´m convinced that this is a general fact.  Before you judge me for not having told you that I have returned to treatment, mom, you should know that I haven´t told you anything because the beginning of the School Year is always a disaster. Sometimes I seriously wonder why I decided to become a teacher and to make things worse, a sentimental Literature one. 

Yes, I know that by now, you are laughing and that you are messing your ridiculous strands of purple hair (is it still purple?) I´m also sure that you´ll tell me  I´m a drama queen but I think that after what has happened to us, after what we both faced in the streets of New York, the world owes us at least the happiness of being able to complain, doesn´t it?

Yes, Shorter, I also know that you never abandoned the treatment, I know that you did well and that now you are happy forever while you run the best Chinese restaurant in the city, and therefore, you have achieved your greatest dream. I know that it is the reason why you have no complaints about your existence but I was starting to feel suffocated again, you know.

Before I went to Dr. Jessica Randy's office, I had felt almost normal again. The nightmares hadn´t bothered me at night, I hadn´t ended up screaming in terror, I hadn´t felt that something inside me was dying when memories invaded me again. I almost thought I had forgotten it, Shorter, I really believed it.

I know you would say I'm stupid and that you truly believe that a few months of therapy with the doctor you worked with would be enough for me to heal but it wasn´t. I know it was my fault because I didn´t give him a genuine opportunity to help me but in those days I believed myself to be normal again. I was just a normal man, Shorter, yes, my past was shit but I really thought I was just this cool guy who has achieved to become famous and successful after all the crap he had faced before.

 So it´s totally true that I had come to feel like a normal man again, I swear I felt that I had achieved it and yet, everything fell apart when I saw the face of  the guy who caused me to go back to my hurt self.  

I don´t want you to start to assume stupid things, but everything went wrong again when I was introduced to the new exchange professor, the man who will work with us for a year and who happens to be one of the most recognized photographers in Japan, a photographer who was also an elite athlete. His name is Eiji Okumura and years ago he won a gold medal in the Olympics. Have you heard anything about him?

  
I guess not, his sport is not very popular anyway. Professor Okumura used to practice pole vaulting so he is not exactly a sports rockstar but everyone here went crazy from the very moment his arrival to the faculty of Fine Arts was announced. Even the literature people seemed to know him, everyone has looked at some of his photographs, everyone knows his name and he would have the right to be an arrogant asshole but he is not, I doubt he knows all the commotion he causes around him.

The first time ever I saw him I thought he was one of the awkward freshmen students. He is one of those people for whom time doesn´t seem to run at the same pace as it does for other human beings. What I want to say is that I was told the man is around twenty-seven years old and yet he looks like a child.

Physically, Professor Okumura is nothing special. He is a young Japanese man with brown eyes and dark hair, he´s less tall than we are. If you find him on the street he would not call your attention and yet everything changes when you see him smile, something in him lights up. His smile illuminates everything around him, Shorter, when you look straight at him, you can notice that something inside his eyes hurts but it doesn´t matter because his smile is able to blind you and make you forget about how horrible the world is.

I know I sound like a lunatic but I think it was his light that made everything go wrong again. There is something in him that is fragile and sad, completely sad. In his eyes and in his smile there is still so much innocence, an innocence that no one has touched, not in the way they did with us and I ... there it is, I finally said it. I think it's the innocence in Professor Okumura's eyes that reminds me of what happened in the past.

I think he's as fragile as we were when the nightmare began. He reminds me of what we were, what we will never be again and it hurts me to look at him because of that. It hurts to look at him even when the only way to survive that we found in the past was to become hard-hearted, and I swear I keep working on my protection wall every day of my life. Still, the ghosts of the past that´s in the eyes of a boy who doesn´t know me nor will know nothing of me was enough to destroy all my defenses.

 Looking at Eiji Okumura hurts, Shorter, and that is why I decided to consult a new therapist again.

This time I chose a woman because I think I will always have some fear if it is a man. At the end of the day, the men were the pigs that hurt us and I know that not all of them are like that but this time I don´t want to abandon the treatment. After the first therapy session, Dr. Jessica asked me to write a diary. At first, I really thought about buying one of those fashionable hipster notebooks but then I remembered that it would be better to write to you because you understand, no one but you could understand me. What do you want me to say? I studied literature, and like everyone else in this world, we love writing and having someone who reads what we have written.

Make fun out of me all you want and if you do not want to read these e-mails, then ignore all the messages that will come from now on from this email address but do not prevent me from writing them, much less sending them to you.

I have always believed that reading, and even more the magical act of writing something, are the things that have helped me to free myself. Therefore, I know that you can bravely support these cheesy emails that have nothing to do with my dramatic novels thanks to which I can live well now. You don´t have to answer me but I thought that talking to the void always hurt us a lot and that's why I would like to talk to you, best friend. 

Anyway, I have to leave you now because the school year starts tomorrow and I have to terrorize my new students. It is one of my favorite sports in college and I have a reputation to take care of. After all, I am the wonderful teacher Aslan Jade Callenreese, also known as Ash Lynx, bestseller author, aka "the ruthless Lynx that will torture us all during the year". The terror of the students keeps me young, although it may be their hope and desire to create stories, which have that effect in me. In the end that is the reason why I love teaching the creative writing class.

 All right, skip that last line, I'm disgusted of myself.

  
Well, wish me luck and tell Nadia, your sister, that I miss her food starting today. Maybe I can see you at the weekend, what do you think? It would be good to laugh at you for a change, you know.

By the way, I think I should not worry so much about Professor Okumura, do I?  I will not even have to see him that much because we are part of different academic departments. I do not think that suddenly the departments of photography and literature will decide to make a merger. Maybe I won´t meet him again during the year, I have to see him only at tomorrow's  ceremony and that will be all, won´t it?

  
I do not want to see Eiji Okumura, Shorter. I am a coward but I do not want to see him because the innocence in his eyes is so similar to what you and I had in our faces when monsters first came.

 Well, if you got here I thank you and if not, go to hell.

 Love, Ash.

 

 


	2. Subject: Do you still believe everybody loves you just because you´re fucking handsome?

**From: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**To: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**Subject: Do you still believe everybody loves you just because you´re fucking handsome?**

Answer to the first question: yes, you've always been a fucking arrogant asshole who´s perfectly conscious of your own beauty. I think you've heard too many times that your green eyes are like the bright jade at dawn and that your blonde hair could compete with the golden sun. No, don´t frown at my words, you are the one who says those things more often than other people do

Nevertheless you're right about something, Lynx, I can understand what we went through and that's why, idiot, and not because you're the love of my life that I'm honored to know you trust me this way.

And for further information, this does not bother me I know how horrible it is to heal, Ash, but it's worth it and although I know that inside your heart you still believe that you are that lonely leopard that died among the snows of Kilimanjaro you are not alone. I have always been here and I will be here in order to read everything you need to write. You are my best friend after all and the abyss that we both have inside is not something that can be easily fixed.

I'm really glad you have returned to treatment and I feel it is my citizen duty to tell you that it will be a shit but that's the thing, Ash: you cannot heal if you insist on being the same person you were before. Changing hurts, looking back at the past we have always wanted to erase, will hurt. However, it is worth it, I can assure you it’s worth it and in reality you're not much of a coward as you think. Coward is an adjective you would never have to use.

By the way, I am intrigued by the description you have made of the new photography teacher, although you omitted the little detail of whether he is hot or not. Why is it important to know if he has a sun-like smile? Make your descriptions better, Aslan! (or attach photos, we are in the XXI century and you have an IQ higher than 200, I know you can manage it).

Ok, that was a bad joke, but even if he reminds you of painful things, avoid being rude to him, will you? The poor guy doesn´t know anything about us, he just came to your place of work by chance, he cannot hurt you. If he knows the pain then he is like us and that´s very sad. I hope no one has damaged him the same way some people damaged us.

What I want to tell you is that if he brings unpleasant memories to you, you will surely want to treat him with disdain and coldness because despite your intelligence, you are an imbecile when socializing, and breaking news my friend: you´re going to have to socialize with him, you told me something before, remember?

This year, you will have to work on a multidisciplinary project within NYU and I remember that you also mentioned that it will be Max Lobo, your principal, who will assign the working groups. For that reason, I'll leave before you want to kill me for mentioning that there's actually a huge possibility that you have to work with the man but just remember that we've survived worse things than this one. In addition, maybe being around someone like Professor Okumura does you good or maybe not, but you will not know until it happens so stop imagining horrible things and just keep working on your treatment. Be kind to yourself, Aslan!

I´ve already talked with Nadia and she has told me that you are more than welcomed to have dinner with us next Saturday and if Professor Okumura is hot, bring him with you because my sister keeps on saying that I should marry someone and meeting an Olympic champion seriously sounds good to me. Actually bring any handsome bachelor who you haven´t yet scared with your devilish humor, I just want Nadia to stop bothering me.

We'll see you soon Lynx, and thanks for taking me as your personal diary. Maybe now you can admit that it's you the one who has loved me all these years and not the other way around.

 

Love, Shorter.


	3. Subject: I HATE YOU.

**From: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**To: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**Subject: I HATE YOU**

 

I HATE YOU.

I HATE YOU.

I HATE YOU.

I HATE YOU.

IN ADDITION, I HATE MULTIDISCIPLINARY PROJECTS AS WELL!

 

WITH INTENSE, BLACK AND BURNING HATE, ASH.


	4. Subject: Start-up meeting.

**From: NYU_literature@gmail.com**

**To: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**Subject: Start-up meeting.**

 

Dear Professor Callenreese:

  
On behalf of our principal, I ask you to accompany us tomorrow at the start-up meeting that will take place in the main conference room of the Faculty of Fine Arts.

This meeting has to do with the multidisciplinary project which will be developed along the school year which is about to begin. In this meeting, a partner will be assigned to work with you throughout the year. All the details will be discussed tomorrow and we will be able to answer your questions as well. The meeting starts at six in the afternoon, try to arrive on time.

Principal Lobo also requested me to ask your help with Professor Okumura. The poor man still doesn´t know the location of the important places of the building so he will be waiting for you at the entrance of the campus so that, you can guide him to the correct room. We know that we are bothering you but you are the best teacher we have and we think you are the right one to welcome Professor Okumura. I appreciate your help in advance.

Best regards,

Linda Greenfield, Principal´s assistant.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This work was inspired by Korean singer Jonghyun´s song "Before our spring", maybe you can listen to it too. It´s beautiful, I swear! On the other hand, I´m a little bit nervous to be finally posting this story so if you get to this point, thank you for reading my first AshEiji long fic and it´d be great if you share your thoughts about it with me :)


	5. Subject: And the million-dollar question is...

**From: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**To: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**Subject: And the million-dollar question is...**

 

I like to be alone in the middle of my office; I think I'm way too used to being alone. Dr. Jessica said that this isn´t all-good because of all the bad habits that I have accumulated over the years, I know this is the most challenging to give up on.

Even if you say I'm crazy for thinking something like that, Shorter, you should know that loneliness becomes addictive when you let yourself get caught up in it. It comes to you in gentle waves that don´t drown you and then you find yourself sailing in a calm sea where even the storms can´t hurt you: because you become part of the storm, because perhaps when you are alone, you are the storm and the calm at the same time.

I have become accustomed to loneliness that is the truth. I became addicted to it and now I am scared because everything that is happening around me is changing too fast. I think I must be cursed because the change began with the arrival of Professor Okumura to this university and it is as if the world, my world, it would have started to turn around him without being able to do anything to avoid it.

Since last afternoon, when I was forced to guide him to the meeting room, I cannot stop seeing him everywhere; sometimes I wonder if my sick mind is actually looking for him in the middle of the crowds.

Moreover, I do not even have to make an effort because the man usually gives his classes outdoors. I was about to make a complaint about it (because it´s very distracting to my poor soul) until I found myself looking out the window. OK, you won, I was looking for him because there´s something peaceful in the way   his long black hair waves in the wind and in the way his hands guide  the hands of his students to obtain the best shots of sunlight among the leaves of the huge trees that adorn the courtyard of the Faculty of Fine Arts.

It's not like he's looking for me, either. In fact, when he met me at the entrance to the campus last week, it seemed to me rather that the man was dying of shame at the director's request. I swear he apologized at least five hundred times for causing me such a terrible discomfort and I had to assure him another five hundred times that we could not call the situation a nuisance because it is actually part of my job.

What I said seemed to reassure him, you know.  When I mentioned it was my responsibility, something in Professor Okumura seemed to relax. I guess it was  because the Japanese always give a barbaric importance to fulfill your duty, so after that, the man gave me one of his bright smiles and he just walked by my side without forcing a conversation to which I wouldn´t have been able to respond adequately anyway.

Yet, Shorter, for a moment I thought it would have been nice to talk to someone like him. I mean, you know what always happens with the young exchange teachers, they are never afraid to look for having an affair with me… I mean, it is not that I want Professor Okumura to seek an affair with me, nor am I taking for granted that he thinks I'm terribly handsome too and…

Forget the last paragraph, will you? I´m not making any sense.

Let´s start again.

What I really want to say is that I know that Eiji Okumura may also be a person who knows a lot about loneliness despite having been for many years a well known face in his country. You can tell that he´s actually a famous face in the world of photography where he has moved since he stopped participating actively in sports. Nevertheless, something in him makes me believe that Professor Okumura is an addict to loneliness too and maybe I felt like talking to him because, well, maybe two solitudes like ours can understand each other, can´t they?

I think that when I was walking beside professor Okumura I really forgot that looking at him hurts. When I was next to him, I didn´t feel any pain, I just felt curiosity instead. I wanted to ask him a thousand things, for example, if New York seems nice to him, if he had been here before in some competition, that kind of nonsense stuff that any stupid person asks when they want to make a friendly conversation with a complete stranger.

However, I didn´t ask him anything, I didn´t feel capable of breaking that silence because it actually was a comfortable and peaceful silence. Eiji Okumura is in fact a gentle person, he´s peaceful like his own quietness.

“Thank you indeed for your kindness, Professor Aslan Callenreese”, he said before saying goodbye to me at the entrance to the meeting room. Our principal, Max Lobo was calling him from the front part of the auditorium in order to introduce him to the whole community of professors. “I think we´ll be in touch from now on.”

After that, while I was left blank by the way he had pronounced my first name, he took another bow at me  and smiled in the only way that I imagine, he is able to smile: with all the light of the arctic stars on the lips. Because no, Shorter, I was wrong the last time, he doesn´t have a sun-like smile: he smiles like a distant constellation because the light that comes from him is cold and yet it´s enough to break any trace of darkest around him.

I think the smile he gave me was the cause of everything. In order for me to seeing him smiling again, I can´t stop looking for him everywhere. As he has stars in his smile, I still wish I had said something or maybe it would have been a good idea to invite him to dinner with you and Nadia.  However, I did not invite him because I´m sure you´d scare him or worse, you would have begun to court him.  Don’t take this wrong but I think you couldn´t be a good husband for him or for anyone. I´m telling you this as your best friend, Shorter:  you lack of dedication and commitment to be a good husband.

Anyway, what is happening to me? I had assumed that the existence of Professor Okumura caused me pain but now it isn´t pain but curiosity and that´s a thousand times worse because you know how I am when I want to unravel a mystery: I don´t give up until I achieve it but I also know the mysteries are dangerous. Of course, I know it sounds like something in Eiji Okumura inevitably attracts me but let´s not call it that way.  I'm sure what I feel isn´t something as banal as a simple attraction that will not get me anywhere.

As for my assignment of a partner for the multidisciplinary project, the director left it to our free will, although he did make the rules of the game very clear. I should have felt released, you know. I should have been happy with Max's decision but I just felt terribly agitated. You already know, Shorter, that when I have to work in teams, I always end up doing things on my own with the pretext that no one else wanted to work with me.  However, I still feel uneasy and here's the million-dollar question: do you think it's too much if I ask Professor Okumura to work with me?

Please tell me it is a stupid thing to do and prevent me from committing such insane actions. Save me Shorter, you have saved me many times before so do it one more time, will you?

P.S. I will not accept any joke that this sounds like a love confession, so if you are thinking of answering this e-mail with nonsense, please put your opinions in that part of your anatomy that doesn´t see the sun very often.

Love, Ash.

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you can continue reading this story, thanks a lot for your support and for give this a try :)


	6. Subject: Of course it sounds like a love confession because IT IS ONE!

**From: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**To: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**Subject: Of course it sounds like a love confession because IT IS ONE!**

  
My dear Aslan, friend of mine, partner in crime and other things not so pleasant to be:

 

It's my duty to inform you that you sound like a fifteen-year-old schoolgirl in love with the youngest teacher in high school. I know you´re so reticent to call the things by their actual names and it´s OK, we don´t need to put tags on everything, do we? Nevertheless, it´s also my duty to ask you if  you really read your mail before sending it. I still feel chills because of the sincerity in your words. It was scary to read that you speak like that about a person you've only seen a couple of times in your life!

And since you don´t want me to have fun with you, I'll just quote a paragraph from that book you gave me once in which someone said: "Do it, if you do it, you may regret it a moment, but if you don´t, you'll regret it all your life ."

So that's your answer: DO IT.

The end.

P.S. That part of my body that doesn´t see the sun very often really needs some affection, by the way. It's serious that I need you to get me a date. Do something good for me for a change, will you?

 

Love, Shorter


	7. Subject: Multidisciplinary project.

**From: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**To: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**Subject: Multidisciplinary project.**  

 

Professor Callenreese:

I hope you do not mind the fact that I asked Principal Lobo for your contact information. All this week I´ve been trying to communicate with you personally but I am afraid that whenever I came to see you, you were very busy. So I don´t really know if someone else has approached you to ask about your availability as a partner in the multidisciplinary project that we have to carry out this year at NYU.

I understand very well that you probably wouldn´t trust the work of a foreigner too much, but I would like to talk with you about the idea that I have been working on for the past two years and that is, in fact, the foundation of my practice as a teacher. I have been working directly on the relationship that photography and literature have and will always have. Besides (and I feel a bit idiotic to say it this way) I've always been a fan of your work as a writer, I like the way you shape life in letters. You are able to photograph life with words and I would like to show you that someone could also tell stories with images.

I sincerely wish you allow me to speak with you about this project. I remain at your entire availability and know that it will be an honor to speak with you even if your decision is not working with someone like me in the project.   

Thank you again for guiding me to the meeting last week. I still feel a little guilty about that, so I hope you will also allow me to invite you to eat at my house. By now, I don´t know much about the best places to eat in New York but my friends in Japan always said that I cook well so maybe you can give it a try.  

Well, I will not take your time anymore. Feel free to contact me whenever you want. 

Best regards, Eiji Okumura, professor of photography.


	8. Subject: Re: Multidisciplinary  project (SHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORTEEEEEEEEEER !!!!!)

**From: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**To: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**Subject: Re: Multidisciplinary project (SHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORTEEEEEEEEEER !!!!!)**

Did you read it?

Does it say what I think it says?

WHAT DO I DO SHORTER? 

How the hell will I answer? 

What is breathing, what is living?

 DOES EIJI OKUMURA WANT TO WORK WITH ME? 

AND IS HE **MY FAN?**  SHOOOOOOOOOOORTEEEEEEEERRRRR !! 

Answer him yes on my behalf. I am dead and I´m not planning to raise from the dead. 

**From the other world, Ash.**

 

 -------------Forwarded message-----------------

From: okumura.eiji@gmail.com

Date: Tue., 9 Sept 2018 08:15 p.m.

Subject: Re: Multidisciplinary project. 

 

Professor Callenreese:

I hope you do not mind the fact that I asked Principal Lobo for your contact information. All this week I´ve been trying to communicate with you personally…


	9. Subject: Infernal writer´s block.

**From: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**To: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**Subject: Infernal writer´s block.**

It's been over twelve hours since I received his mail and I still cannot answer Eiji Okumura. I know this is kind of a stupid behavior - and you will tell me that the stupid one is me - but I just don´t find myself able to answer him properly. My mind is blank, I don´t know what to say, I do not know how to answer professor Okumura´s request in a simple and clear way.

Yes, I think we're about to witness the zombie apocalypse but the super sales author has not the slightest idea about what to write. Saying that I have spent the last few hours reading his message then trying to write an answer and finally erasing it simply to return to feel miserable, is an understatement. I haven´t even been able to sleep and if now I´m sitting down to write to you one more time, it is because I decided to arrive early to the classroom where everything is quiet, at least on the outside.

I had the slight hope that once I was surrounded by the loneliness of one of my favorite places in the universe, the winning ideas of literature awards will come to me, but it is not so. I keep looking at the blank screen in front of me in search of a memorable response for Professor Okumura and I can´t.

What´s more, it´s until now that I can pause to ask myself why it is so important for me to have a memorable answer for him. The man only causes me a headache after another since I saw him and yet, I really want to work with him but…

How can I do that?

How can I tell him that I accept although he will probably regret having chosen me when he gets to know me better?

As I´m writing all these childhood doubts that are gnawing at me, I feel like I'm a disaster, Shorter. When I think I am not even close to him yet, something inside me says that I would not like my response to change his mind, or worse, if my answer does not change his mind, do you think he will end up moving away from me if he comes to know about everything we went through? Do you think he will get away from me when he meets the real Ash, that Ash who has nothing to do with the character that the literary world has created for the enjoyment of all audiences?

This is another thing that I cannot understand: why am I afraid of the possibility of telling professor Okumura everything about myself even though I know that our relationship will be based on work? I mean, you don´t have to talk about the greatest tragedies of your life with your teammate, do you? Or, am I the one who wishes that as time goes by, we can both be more than just coworkers?

I'm stupid for thinking so many absurd things but it has been a long time since a person made me wish I was not alone.

Okay, I said it: Eiji Okumura makes me wish I was not alone because I want to be close to him and discover all the mysteries that are hidden in his huge, round black eyes. Have I told you about his eyes? His gaze hides a thousand mysteries; the loneliness of my soul could well be lost all at once in his eyes. I think that´s the reason I want him to look at me one more time, many times, actually…

Oh shit ... that's why, right? Am I making a storm in a teapot because I am simply afraid to get away from my loneliness? Hell, I hate to admit it but the idea of writing a diary may not be as stupid as I thought not if it makes me realize all these things.

Anyway - insert dramatic sigh - you are right. I'll simply answer him that I'll see him at lunchtime and that we can talk in the cafeteria. Maybe I can invite him to eat a shrimp and avocado salad, the only dish that is not a complete garbage in this place, and then I'll let him tell me about his ideas. This is the best plan I´ve ever had in my life, isn´t it?  Of course I will also accept to work with him because perhaps the idea of bonding literature and photography is not so outlandish, I have also been thinking about projects to develop and…

OMFG!!

Shorter, Shorter ... I'm listening to his voice. Am I going crazy?

No, I'm not going crazy!

HE IS HERE! He´s talking to the students who are surely waiting for my class to start at the corridor.

But, but ... I'm sure he has no class until noon today and no, I'm not stalking him, the schedules of all the professors of this faculty are public domain but ... what is he doing here?

HOLY CRAP! HE IS WALKING TOWARDS ME WHILE I CONTINUE PRETENDING TO BE FOCUSED ON THE WRITING OF THIS E-MAIL!

EIJI OKUMURA IS LOOKING FOR **ME!  ME!**

HE CAME TO SEE **ME!**

Shit, shit, shit! He must come to tell me that his e-mail was a mistake, right? Yes, someone else must have asked him to work with him, it wouldn´t be a surprise, I heard that half of the teachers had him in their sights and he is surely being pressured and he comes to tell me that since I did not answer him in time, he accepted the proposal from someone else and holy heaven!

Shorter, Shorter ... SHORTERRRRRRRRRR! WHAT CAN I DO?

I´ve just made eye contact with him and now he is smiling at me and greeting me from afar.Why does he smile like that? It should be illegal! They should deport him to Japan for smiling like that and making my heart…

SHORTER-HE-IS- STANDING-RIGHT-IN- FRONT-OF-ME-GOODBYE.

DGHASLKDGHAFSDNAFDHMAFDHAMSFDHSAFDHSAFDASASHFDASHDASHFDASDHASFDASHDHASFDASHFDASHFDHSAFJDFVSNCFTSDIQWUGDIQGBDKHADSVASUDVYSAFDYWS¡¡¡  

 


	10. Subject: I think I made it.

**From: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**To: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**Subject: I think I made it.**

 

My dear Yut-Lung:

In order to prevent myself of being scolded by you on the phone because I haven´t been in touch and so, I have left you out of the adventure you called yourself _"What kind of stupid ideas are those, Eiji?”,_  I´ve  decided to write you this e-mail  thus you can understand some things. 

Let me start by saying that I have been ignoring you- please don´t send your guards to kill me- for one simple reason: I didn´t want to give you the pleasure of saying "I told you so". I wanted to prove you wrong so, since I arrived in New York, I've been focused on accomplishing that little goal you thought was impossible to reach for someone like me: working with Aslan Jade Callenreese.

Well,  guess what? I´VE MADE IT!

If I could, I would send you a bunch of pictures of my smile to make you mad with my happiness, but come on, I'm not so cruel. Even though you've done nothing but making fun of me and my plan I do consider you a real friend. I´m so happy, Yue, and no, it’s not because I´m in love with Ash. I´m not and I´ll never be in love with him and it´s time for you to understand it. I just admire him so much. I love his books. I´m just a fanboy of his and I think it doesn´t cause him any wrong.

So eat your heart out, my friend, and if Sing is next to you, as I imagine he must be because you two are still a disgustingly sweet couple, tell him he owes me the dinner he promised me to have as soon as I make my dream come true.

I can hardly believe that this has happened, Yue. I came to America with the sole desire to meet the writer who saved my soul from the most complete darkness when the whole issue of my injury occurred. I know you hate me to say it this way but when everyone in Japan hated on me for having dared myself to truncate what was undoubtedly a successful career in athletics with something as selfish as an irreparable injury, Ash Lynx´s books were the only thing that saved me from madness.

Before you start rolling your eyes and calling me an ungrateful asshole, you have to know that you, Sing and Mr. Ibe were also my main support in those times of crisis. Nonetheless I cannot let Ash out of the picture, I just can´t.

I think that when I started reading his stories I didn´t even know that someday I would like to thank him in some way for having given my life a new meaning.  I don´t care if that sounds cheesy but his books let me know that if a road ends unexpectedly, then you can always find another path to continue with your journey.

So I´m enjoying the journey that started when I became Mr. Ibe's photography assistant, not knowing that this path would lead me to do other great things that I would have never imagined. This journey has taken the course I´ve always dreamed of, you know? Now I can see Ash every day and he is not at all the person that I had imagined.  I believe that the Ash of my dreams could never do justice to the real Ash who is a thousand times more charming and full of kindness.

I must tell you that during the first day of classes, Mr. Lobo, our principal, asked him to take me to the right meeting room and I was so damn embarrassed.  Why did Mr. Lobo think that it would be an intelligent idea to ask a God of Literature like Aslan Jade Callenreese to be my tour guide?  I think I´m still unable to look him in the eye regarding that, and definitely also because his eyes are powerful.

 Yue, Ash´s eyes are so green and strong that I really don´t even understand how the hell I can remain in solid shape when I'm close to him and he's looking back at me.

I know everyone says he is completely beautiful and believe me, he certainly is. I know you can´t accept my statement because you have hated on him forever. Come on, Yue, don´t you think it is time to forgive him for making that review about your mystery novels? He only commented the fact that the only sure thing that will happen in your stories was that half of your characters would die poisoned. That was a joke, then Ash added he actually enjoys reading your stories so ... why don´t you try to let it be? Do it for me, won´t you?

If I'm going to work with Ash for a year and you are planning to come to New York on  Christmas, at some point I have to introduce you to him and frankly I don’t want to say: _“Hey, Ash, this is my best friend Yut-Lung Lee who hates you with all his heart.”_

Could you at least pretend that you don´t hate him that much?

Don´t answer me yet, we still have time to work on it since autumn has just arrived in New York and I really wish the school year not to go by so quickly because I want to make many memories about the place where I am now. I want to remember all the people I will meet, and all the students who work with me and who trust me to teach them something of value.

You have to know that everyone at the University of New York is completely friendly with me, I think I´ve adapted faster than I thought. I promise that as soon as I can, I´ll pay a visit to your cousins Shorter and Nadia, or maybe I´ll ask Ash to accompany me. After all, I invited him to eat with me at home but I think  in America it has certain implications that could be misunderstood if I invite him to my house very often so, if we were in a public place it would be better, wouldn´t it?

Well, maybe I shouldn´t take for granted that Ash and I are already friends. It is certainly true Ash has been kind to me but it doesn´t mean we will be friends simply because that is the desire of my heart, right? Even when he has treated me with all kindness and respect he´s still the great Ash Lynx so, I mustn´t forget that little detail.

When I talked to him today before his first morning class, I really wanted to ask him how he could remain so neutral in all kinds of situations because, while he was listening to me with all his undivided attention, I was trying not to faint in front of him. I had to make a huge effort to avoid babbling Japanese nonsense instead of speaking the correct English that you and Sing taught me and that took me so long to learn.

Being close to him is a complete challenge because at his side I look like a foolish and lost child even though I am two years older than he is. Ash Lynx is strong and attractive as are his stories. When I got to talk to him, I know he was probably writing some of his marvelous works of art and I felt guilty for daring to interrupt him again but I could not resist it anymore, you know?

Yesterday I sent him an email asking him to be my project´s team mate and since I hadn´t received an answer, I decided to talk to him directly because you know how I am, my anxiety always brings out the best of me. Although I know I interrupted something important, Ash greeted me with sympathy and he even smiled in a friendly way when he apologized for not answering my e-mail.

"I thought I would see you later and that's why I haven´t written you an answer, Professor Okumura," he told me calmly. “But I'm glad you came; now I can answer you without further delay.”

“Do you already have an answer, Professor Callenreese?” I asked and I swear that my heart was beating insanely, so quickly that I thought it would explode.

“Of course, it will be an honor to work with you.” He said and I swear I had to repress myself so as not to jump all over his office of pure happiness. “But I must ask for something in return.”

“Whatever you want, professor”, I answered and I think that I had never said anything more certain in my life.

“Can you call me Ash?” he asked directly. “Would you mind if I call you Eiji? I know that in your culture is not so common that people who are unknown to you use your first name. Nevertheless, I thought that if we are going to work together for a year this would be the best but I do not want you to feel uncomfortable or think I'm rude but your name is cute and…”

"Call me Eiji then, Ash ..." I replied with a bright smile that made his green eyes fill with light. “I´m so glad you have agreed to work with me.”

“I hope not to disappoint you, Eiji” he said with a sad smile that made me notice that behind his fair façade there must be an ancient pain that he has completely hidden.

"Never, Ash" I assured him firmly. “Then, I'll see you this afternoon because you'll also let me prepare a thank-you dinner won´t you? Then, I´ll tell you about my ideas for the project. What do you think?”

 “Eiji, it's not necessary, I ...”

“Is it okay if I wait for you outside your office? I don´t live far from the university so don´t be afraid, I won´t get lost. Is it okay at seven?”

He nodded without adding more words and smiled kindly when I said goodbye to him not without thanking him a thousand times more for having chosen me to work with him. So I'm sorry, Yut-Lung, this time you're wrong and I think that through my project I'll be able to show Ash how grateful I feel for he has  filled the world with the magic of his stories.

Wish me luck, would you? I need it because I don´t want to disappoint him and because if I manage to make the pain of its gaze cease to exist, then we will both be at hand, won´t we? Let me dream; let me think that I would be able to be a meaningful person in his life the way Ash´s life has been in mine.

Anyway, now I have to leave you because I'm going to prepare a traditional Japanese dinner for him, I hope he's not one of those Americans who live on hamburger meat and ketchup. I hope Ash to like my food and yes, your majesty, I´ll avoid making him try Natto, I know that everybody hates it.

Today's dinner is the real start of my trip, Yue, you can continue making fun of me,  but it is nice to know that although Ash and I are two different people, from different origins and destinations, at least for a part of our journey we will be together and we will look in the same direction. I'm dying to learn more things from a genius like him. I'm really excited!

With love and honest happiness as I haven´t felt long ago, Eiji.

P.S. Say hello to Sing and tell Mr. Ibe that I hope to invite him to the opening of my new exhibition of photographs in Brooklyn. I am still preparing it; I feel that something is missing but I will definitely have it ready for December. I hope you've actually read all the mail before calling on the phone to shout at me and drop your dragon fury on me. Remember that I love you, Yue.

 


	11. Subject: Get a room!

**From: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**To: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**Subject: Get a room!**

 

Stupid asshole that has proclaimed himself as my best friend:

  1. You make me sick. I really dreaded going blind from so much rolling my eyes as I read all the heartwarming things that Ash Lynx makes you feel inside your virgin maiden's heart. Seriously, Eiji, you're worse than me in my first week of dating I swear you're worse than Sing on our honeymoon!
  2. If  Ash Lynx- aka the most stupid writer of the universe- and you continue flirting like that (and you have hardly spoken once for God´s sake!), you are really going to have to look for a room. Try not to traumatize your poor students by giving them a low quality porn show in the classroom. It is a very bad idea as well as being a cliché of the industry. The story of two teachers fucking like rabbits in a classroom has been told a million times so please, avoid it.
  3. Are you really going to force me to be related to the idiot Aslan Jade Callenreese? I dislike him and I will never stop hating on him, Eiji! In addition, tell him that if I ever see him again, I'm going to poison him as if he were the most despicable character of my novels.
  4. OK, you got me here. You know I´ll never hurt someone you care about and if that stupid one matters to you this much, what can I do? Just be sure you don´t make him your new best friend, will you? I couldn´t stand it, don´t change me for someone who isn´t worth it. Make Aslan your boyfriend, your fiancé or your American affair but never your best friend, is that okay?
  5. Good luck! I'm serious, though right now I'm going to call you and obviously I'll have to scold you for being a sentimental fool. I hope Ash Lynx realizes how lucky he is to have you near him. Because although you never notice it, there is something in you that makes the lives of the people who are close to you change for the better. At least that's what happened with me. You always say that Sing and I were the ones who helped you but you have no idea, Eiji, in how many ways you saved us both too.
  6. Before I say more sappy things, I'll send this email and get ready for a marathon-size reprimand and I don´t care that right now you're preparing your romantic dinner with Lynx. I will be brutally honest with you about what I think of that cheap writer you admire so much. You deserve it and I´ll do it because I´m really worried about you.



 

With love, because I'm the only one who truly loves you, Yut-Lung.     


	12. Subject: Are you still in the other world?

**From: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**To: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**Subject: Are you still in the other world?**

Ash,

I'm really worried. After your morning mail, you haven´t written anything to me, and you are not answering the damn phone either. Where the hell are you? Did Eiji Okumura send you to hell for not answering him in time? Oh, wait ... you're with him right now, aren´t you?

Ok, ok, I understand. Make him love you with all your charm, Lynx, and don´t forget to tell me all about it tomorrow and don´t omit any of the dirty details because I´m your private diary and you shouldn´t keep anything from me. It´s not that I enjoy gossiping, remember that it was your therapist´s prescription.

By the way, I´m so envious you got yourself a date!

 

Love, Shorter, your forever alone friend.


	13. Subject: Adorable.

**From: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**To: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**Subject: Adorable.**

Do you think it is possible to die of an _adorability_ attack?

There is a stupid emoticon my students use indiscriminately in their text messages and, in some cases, they have even dared to use it in some of their final papers. It has unleashed my academic fury, of course, but I have to admit that symbol can be useful for me now.

 I'm certainly going to die after writing this -and surely my recognitions in the field of literature will spontaneously combust- but I´m going to use the same emoticon to describe Eiji Okumura because he is like this:

**UwU**

I swear that while I was in front of him, unable to do anything but watching him silently, the cursed symbol kept appearing as flashing lights in my head. I had to make an admirable effort not to drown myself with food while listening to him talk about the dishes he prepared for me. He is a good cook, and when I told him he was good wife material, he laughed happily and a lot of UwU appeared in my eyes again.

Eiji Okumura is adorable, Shorter. I cannot describe him in any other way: his gestures are adorable. His smile is adorable. The things he says and does are adorable and the only thing I felt while I was in front of him was a tremendous desire to take him in my arms and protect him from the cruelty of the world.  I think something as completely adorable as him, could be destroyed in an instant and yet he is completely strong too. He must be strong because even though he did not reveal too many details of his private life he did explain to me that he distanced himself from the sports world due to a critical injury that truncated his path.

I think I can imagine the hell in which his life might have turned after that. I mean, when you are a famous person you cannot avoid others from feeling the owners of your life;  when you expose yourself to the world people begin to feel that they have certain rights over you. Eiji (because now it is just Eiji, I don´t accept comments about it) told me with a sad smile that it was difficult to cope with that situation and I believe him because do you remember when that happened to both of us?

At that time we were just a couple of teenagers, Shorter, but after Max Lobo revealed the truth about everything that happened in Golzine´s mansion in that article that won the Pulitzer Prize, the two of us were also harassed by the cameras and all the sensationalist reporters who covered the case.  They wanted to have their slice of bucks in the whole thing. They just continued asking us for details as if having been the sex toys of an old pervert pig wouldn´t have been enough. As if being sold and abused as useless dolls for years would not have been terrible enough.

However, while Eiji was telling me about his pain, a part of me, that horrible part that sometimes I cannot help but come out, wanted to laugh and tell him that his suffering does not even compare to ours. I really thought something like that, Shorter and that made me a little scared because what kind of person am I? Why do I believe that my pain is more important than what others have suffered? The pain is pain, period. Of course, I understand that part, Dr. Jessica says that for each of us pain is a different beast. After all, we ourselves are just animals condemned to pain, don´t you think?

Yes, I know that at this point you will begin to think that I have fallen back into one of my depressive episodes but it is not like that. The things that Eiji told me, yes, they made me remember uncomfortable things about our past but that does not mean that I have been carried away again by grief and anger.

In fact, Eiji did not give me time for that because even though it's clear that his retirement will always be an open wound to him, he didn´t let his pain infect him and that's why I tell you he´s a strong man. When I asked him if it was true he had won an Olympic gold he smiled and invited me to watch one of the videos of the competition, that video that went around the world since on that occasion, Eiji imposed a world record that´s still undefeated.

I think when I watched him fly, Shorter, because Eiji knows how to fly, a part of my heart melted at the sight of Eiji's body flying across the sky. His eyes, which are usually sweet, looked fierce before he began his career towards the bar that he would have to cross to deserve the Olympic gold. In his eyes, you could read the strong desire to make history and to show the whole world that he was the best in his field. Eiji looked like the wind's master; his hands were clinging to the pole like someone holding a sword before going to a battlefield.

The moment his hands released the pole and his body lifted over the bar to beat gravity for a second before falling once more, Eiji was beautiful. There is no other word to describe him, never in my life had I seen anything as beautiful as his flight. Eiji knows how to fly, Shorter, and I wanted to join the clamor of the crazed crowd that cheered the undisputed champion of that competition.

“You were superb ...” I told him because my brain wasn´t working well at all, not after having seen him do that, not after having been drunk from his presence all through the afternoon.

“Do you think?” he asked modestly and I smiled because even his cheeks were flushed by my compliment.

“Of course, and that´s what everybody else thought about you, Mr. Olympic champion” I said honestly. “You know how to fly, that's a beautiful thing ...”

“Maybe someday I can show you a live jump. I cannot raise myself too high anymore but I think I might surprise you...”

“What do you think tomorrow?”

“It's too son but…”

“Don't you jump for anyone after the first date?” I said and I barely had time to regret my words.

"This is not a date, Professor Callenreese," he said, smiling amusedly. “I knew Americans are straight forward but I'm not worth much as a date, don´t you think?”

“I'll have to differ with you in that statement but ... Eiji, am I making you feel uncomfortable? Truth be told, sometimes I say a lot of nonsense but I'm always like that, it's a bad habit of mine…”

My voice broke at that very moment because you know where that habit comes from, right? Dino and his henchmen taught us well. The art of flirting. The art of courtship. The art of charming any old pervert man with sweet or daring comments depending on the case. I hated myself in that moment, Shorter. I hated myself because I wanted to be nice to Eiji and I ended up using the old whore´s art that I learned so well as a child.

Nevertheless, to my full relief, Eiji smiled in an adorable way (can he smile otherwise?) and blushed again as if he was used to the stupid comments of the people around him. It was at that moment that I felt a little calmer because Eiji is so pure that I know that none of my words was taken wrong.

"You're different from how I always had imagined you to be," he said with a look full of a warm emotion that seemed to cover me suddenly and that took away the discomfort of my soul.

“And is that good or bad?” I asked immediately.

“It's good, now I see it's easy to talk to you. The truth is that I was intimidated by your achievements, by your history in literature. Working with your idol is not easy, Ash.”

“So it is true that you are my fan” I said and I swear I felt that I blushed.

I was blushing. The zombie apocalypse is coming!

“I am, and by the way, I should explain to you about my ideas for the project before you start thinking that I only used it as a pretext to approach you.”

“What if we leave it for tomorrow?” I asked with a funny smile. “For now. You should keep telling me about your flights, so I'll have a pretext to invite you to breakfast tomorrow.”

“Sounds like you're going to interview me for literary purposes. Are you going to write about me in one of your books?” he asked me and I automatically smiled at the thought of writing about him.

“Who knows, Professor Okumura, maybe I will write about you someday.”

If he only knew I'm already doing it, that I've done nothing but write about him since I first saw him, what would he say? What would Eiji think of me if he knew that since I saw him he is my favorite topic of conversation? What would he think of all this? What would he say if he knew I think he is adorable and that I wish I had stayed talking to him all night because now his presence comforts me instead of hurting me? Nevertheless, what I feel is selfish, right?

It is as if I thought that Eiji's existence is designed to comfort me and the very thought of thinking of him as an object made for my own pleasure is so terrible that my heart trembles with terror. Eiji Okumura is too good for me right? I don´t even know what I'm feeling, Shorter. I have never felt anything like this and I am so afraid to start needing something that I will not know how to control. Yet, I don´t want to get away from him which makes me a thousand times worse. I want to be close to him; in fact, I invited him to eat with me tomorrow and maybe this time we will talk about the project or whatever.

I do not know what the hell is wrong with me, but Eiji won´t be in New York forever. So if this is temporary, if I think of this as a grace period in which being close to a person like Eiji will help me not to lose my faith in humanity, everything will be fine, don´t you think?

It's only a year, Shorter, I'm not asking anyone for eternity so get used to reading Eiji's name a thousand times as of today. By the way, Eiji is adorable, I don´t know if I mentioned it before but he´s completely adorable.

Love, Ash.

P.S. Oh, but Eiji has a little defect! In the living room of his house, I could see a framed photo in which Eiji smiles next to who is undoubtedly your favorite cousin. The world is so small! You'd better call his highness before he throws a tantrum when he finds out I'm working with Eiji. The man hates me since he misunderstood my praise for his mystery novels that are, in fact, entertaining. Tell him not to think about speaking crap about me to Eiji and if he wants a public apology, I'll do it. It's time for him to forgive me! Although the little mad snake can think of me what he want, actually.

P.S. 2 Do you realize how affected I am by the existence of Eiji Okumura? I'm thinking of apologizing to Yut-Lung Lee! I'll send this mail before I regret or before I start writing bigger stupidities.


	14. Subject: Stop analyzing everything, nerd, just let yourself go.

**From: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**To: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**Subject: Stop analyzing everything, nerd, just let yourself go.**

Ash:

You really have to start being kinder to yourself, that is one of the first things I learned during my treatment and although it is difficult, I want you to know it is actually possible.

I suppose a part of us, that horrible part as you have called it will bother us all our lives. I also believe that this is the very part of us with which we must be hard on, not with ourselves or with the people around us. We have to fight that executioner who lives inside us and who feeds on the guilt that eats at us because of those crimes that we didn´t even commit.

Ash, there's nothing you should be ashamed of, flirting is not a bad thing itself, it's natural. I guess when the other person attracts you it's impossible not to do so. In spite of your remarkable reluctance to name the things you feel, let's make it clear: Eiji Okumura is special to you, so special that you called him adorable more than ten times in your last mail and believe me, it was clear to me that adorability is your weakness, Lynx.

And I know that the word "weakness" is something you hate, but sometimes it's not so bad to let go of our defenses and, my friend, if you really want to let Eiji get close to you even if it's temporary, you'll have to open up to him in ways that will make you feel vulnerable. That's not bad at all, you know? Sometimes the walls of an old building have to be demolished in order to start building something a thousand times better and thus be able to let the presence of someone settle inside us.

As for not looking for a forever, you´re doing well, maybe eternity is too big of an ambition for humans. If you have decided you cannot be away from the adorable Eiji, then get to know him. Let yourself go to him too and let him continue talking about whatever you want to talk about.  Maybe that way Max  won´t send you both  to hell at the end of the year for having ignored your academic duties, and having had a lot of happy dates instead of getting to work.

I must say that although I haven’t met him yet, I like Eiji me for the mere fact of having achieved that you, a maniac of work, have forgotten everything for a moment. And it's not bad to feel happy about that either, you're not looking at Eiji as an object of pleasure, in fact, you look at him as if he was a wonderful person and I don´t see how that could offend the universe.

Anyway, Aslan Jade Callenreese, you have to stop punishing yourself, my friend. In the past there were too many people who tortured us, people who were terrible, people who inflicted a new wound on those who had not yet healed.  Don´t keep on doing that, would you? Don´t keep on doing what they did for years because Ash, our greatest triumph besides having escaped from that hell, is to stay alive. We are alive, dreaming and making all those things they told us would be impossible to do for us. Stop giving power to ghosts, that's a good start. Stop analyzing everything, nerd, just let yourself go.

Who cares if you and Eiji end up throwing themselves into the void? Eiji knows how to fly, and something tells me, Aslan, that he will be willing to fly with you and even, to catch you in his arms at the end.

With love, Shorter.

P.S. I blame Nadia for such cheesy mail, can you believe that she has got me a blind date? Love is in the air, Ash and since you didn´t do anything for me, best friend, let me then take advantage of the opportunity that my dear sister has put before me. Do you see? The trick is to stop thinking everything. Live, Ash. You are alive and your life being wonderful is the best way to take revenge for all those terrible things that we had to take in the past.


	15. Subject: SOS

**From: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**To: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**Subject: SOS**

 

One and only best friend of my life, his Royal Highness Yut-Lung:

I'm going to meet your cousins Shorter and Nadia tomorrow night. Can you believe it? Once again, I apologize for leaving you on the sidelines of my life but everything has started to move by leaps and bounds at the University.The classes are heavy from the start of the day until the very end so are my other duties as a teacher. What´s more, if you add the pressure of the exhibition that I have to have ready before Christmas, you will grant me that I hardly have time to pick up the phone and answer you.

Yes, I know you will tell me that all those who have dared not to respond immediately to your call, have suffered horrible fates but appealing to your love for me could you excuse me this time, Yue? It's been over a week since you haven´t phoned me or answered my calls, so I infer that you're really upset with me.In my defense, I can also tell you that now I have finally started working with Ash on the multidisciplinary project that adds a little more work to my endless list of chores. Nevertheless, I can tell you that I really enjoy working with Ash.

After the dinner in my apartment when, by the way, we only talk about my old Olympic glories and other insubstantial things, he has become a close person to me. I spend more time with him than with another person from the university and I have quickly become accustomed to having lunch with him. Ash is extremely intelligent and funny even though when I get to meet him in his office or in one of the school halls, his green eyes always look extremely sad.

However, I still don´t have enough confidence to ask him about that sadness. I think it all has to do with a secret that is even horrible to remember and I know very well how it is not to want to share your pain with anyone even though sometimes it turns out that keeping silent about everything that hurts ends up hurting you more.

Nevertheless, I cannot ask Ash about that, don´t you think? At least not now, because I know I said we are close but I don´t think it is an emotional closeness. I refer to the fact that we have become accustomed to being together in our spare time. He always has so many topics to talk about; he is so brilliant and dedicated. I think that my idea about the multidisciplinary project will be really beautiful thanks to all the efforts of Ash and his students who received my idea with interest.

Our students are already working on creating a wonderful book that will be edited by the University of New York. I know that if I say it that way, the idea doesn´t have much of innovative but let me tell you the rest: this book will be divided into two parts. Ash's kids are going to write stories based on a single image, on the best pictures of my students. While, the second part will be a graphic narrative story in which my students will try to tell the best short stories of Ash's writers with images.

Don´t you think it's something beautiful? Although right now I imagine you wrinkling your nose, I know that you also think that my idea is great. That's what you said the first time I told you about my intention to create something like the aforementioned. So I hope your opinion has not changed by the mere fact that my partner in the crime is Aslan Jade Callenreese and not you.

Come on Yue, you don´t have to hate me for this. You know that I am making the most beautiful of my dreams come true and that to reach this point we had to go through enormous difficulties. I'm really worried that all the things I've said can break my friendship with you, sometimes I really do not know what are the things that really bother you and which don´t. However, I know that your hatred for Ash is serious but I wonder if you really can´t forgive him.  Isn´t it normal to make jokes like the one he did among writers?

I know that Ash respects you. He has told me the same countless times as if he wanted me to say it to you. In fact, he asked me how I got to know you. It was a surprise for me to know that your cousin Shorter is Ash's best friend and now I have to ask you why you never told me. Why didn´t you tell me you've met Ash before?

It's not that I'm upset about something like that, I'm just surprised. Ash says that he and your cousin Shorter have a huge debt of gratitude to your family, the Lee family, although he didn´t go into detail about it and his eyes became completely sad at the mention of that fact. Yue, is that also why Sing and you decided to go to Japan? Was that the reason why the two of you decided to get away from America? I'm not going to ask you right now what happened but I'm afraid that what hurt Ash and what hurt you is the same terrible tragedy. And you know how I am, I hate that the people I love are sad, I would do anything to prevent those I love from suffering.

And I'm not saying I love Ash, remember to breathe before you get mad at me. By “people I love”, I mean you, Yut-Lung. You know that I love you like that brother I never had. After my own family let me down when they realized that I wouldn´t be a high-performance athlete anymore, you and Sing were the only thing I could hold on to so that I wouldn´t die of loneliness and sadness. I love you both as my only family. Sometimes I wonder what would happen to me if you hadn´t decided to hire Mr. Ibe as your special photographer during that literary awards ceremony in which I met you. You saved me, Yue, you saved me from my sadness and now I find unfair the fact of not knowing where your own sadness comes from. It is so terrible as not to speak of it and I have the right to be worried about you.

Anyway, I hope that when you come to America in a few more months, you and I can sit face to face to discuss all this with a cup of tea and Sing next to you. As I already told you, I do not feel entitled to ask Ash to ask him about all this, but maybe it's time for you to tell me more about yourself. Nothing you tell me will change my mind about you, you know. Whenever I look at you, I´ll see the fabulous super-sales writer Yut-Lung Lee, genius of mystery novels, and lord and master of the Lee family's business empire.

I hope you can call me later, that's the main reason for this SOS. I'm really nervous to meet Shorter and Nadia since I think they are both Ash's family too. I am afraid that your cousins will realize that I am not fabulous enough to be a friend of the great Aslan Jade Callenreese. I don´t think I´m at all worthy of Ash having been interested in my project and me.

Ash is so kind, careful and attentive to me, Yue. Many teachers have asked me what is the secret to establishing a friendship with him and I don´t know what to answer them because from the moment I spoke with him face to face, everything simply seemed to flow naturally between the two of us. In addition, when Ash laughs at my jokes or praises the food I prepare for him I really feel lucky because he makes me feel part of his world. His green eyes are happy when he talks to me and I don´t want to sound presumptuous but that gives me hope. Seeing tranquility in his eyes makes me believe that I am capable of removing sadness from him in the same way his books managed to help me get out of my depression before.

That's why, my friend, I need your words of wisdom. I don´t want to make a fool of myself in front of Nadia and Shorter, and to make Ash go away from me. I need to know what kind of people your cousins are. I want them to like me, Yue, I don´t want them to ask me to stay away from Ash because right now I think it would be impossible for me to get away from him.

I think I've finally found a friend in America, and I just want that friend to be happy to be friends with me. So, can I count on you? Please call me, I've spent the whole afternoon eating rice and natto as I always do when I'm nervous, and even my afternoon walk to take pictures of the sunsets in the city hasn´t helped me at all.

I know right now I should be working on the two photographs that I need to choose for my next exhibition but I cannot concentrate. Please call me, if you do so I´ll make you an offer you can´t refuse: the theme of my next collection of photographs will be you and your legendary love for Sing Soo-Ling. It´s beautiful, isn´t it?

I'll be waiting to hear your voice, Yue. It doesn´t matter if you call me just to yell at me during the first hour of the phone call. Since I've known you, you've never left me alone so don´t start doing it now, will you? 

With love, and slave worship for Yut-Lung his highness, Eiji. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   

 


	16. Subject: Eiji, honey, there can only be one drama queen in this relationship.

**From: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**To: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**Subject: Eiji, honey, there can only be one drama queen in this relationship.**

My dear Eiji:

I must say that I was a little surprised to read so much drama in one email. I´m starting to think that I´m a very bad influence in your life if we have reached the point where it´s you and not me, who´s making a storm in a teacup.

If I have not answered in a week is due to the huge amount of things that I had to solve in my family businesses in recent days. Everything is crazy Eiji; my brothers are undoubtedly a couple of useless assholes whom I would really like to kill with my own hands every time I have to see them.

I think that if Sing hadn´t made his best effort to protect our firm, it would have been a long time since this family's business would have gone down. What´s more annoying is that even when my beloved husband is always there to solve all the stupidities that Wang-Lung and Hua-Lung are used to do, it hasn´t changed the fact that my brothers always treat me like shit.

However, let´s not repeat the same sad story of my life as always. You already know I hate those stupid men in the same way they hate me. Believe me, I always want to shout  them that they should be grateful to me for providing them with easy money that comes from the legacy our father gave me in his will and which now depends almost entirely on the intelligence and ability that Sing has for business.

Anyway, I know that at this moment the repetitive and tragic story of my life is the least interesting item on your list because you are completely in love with your stupid Lynx. Seriously, Eiji, you're so fucking fond of him that I feel like throwing up and I think that this is the first time you´ve fallen in love with someone, isn´t it?

And don´t give me that crap of: _"oh, I want him to be my best friend forever",_ you know very well that’s not what Ash makes you feel. The stupid Aslan is making you feel another kind of emotions and that´s horrible. I thought you had good taste in men and believe me, that if it were not for the fact that I´ve loved Sing practically all my life, I would have given you the opportunity to love me.  That´s the reason why having fallen in love with Aslan Jade Callenreese is a complete downgrade. G-R-O-S-S!!!!!

Ash is not even that handsome, seriously I've seen a thousand butts better than his. And yes, I know you insist on saying that it's his beautiful green eyes that attract you to him but that´s bullshit.  You are like all the men of the planet, Eiji, you cannot see a nice face (and by face I mean butt) without losing your mind for it.

In addition, yes, you caught me here, Ash and I have a story that is not pleasant to tell. Yes, that was the reason why I had to leave the United States. This is without a doubt a story that I have to tell you when I can look you in the face, but I must warn you now that it will not be pleasant and that I will have to tell you about a world that I hope you never have to know.

All this mess caused too much pain to everyone who got involved and if my family got into it, it was because of Sing. Shorter, my cousin, was always like an older brother to Sing so everything we did, we did for Shorter and helping Callenreese was just a fucking collateral damage that I'll regret my whole life.

However, don´t get so jealous either, although Ash and I were related in this matter, you should know that we never spoke in a profound way. I have learned to contain my desire to kill him every time I see him because he is Sorter’s best friend but if you ask me, I don´t have a bit of affection towards him, much less after the senseless comments he made about my first novel.

I mean, I know I don´t have the computer IQ that he has, but even so, my writing was the only way I found to be able to overcome my mother's death. That's what I can´t forgive, Eiji, Aslan dared to give his erudite opinion about one of the few things that really mean the entire universe to me, he reduced my happy place to a joke and I´ll always hate him for it.

Therefore, my dear, I can tell you part of the story, I'll tell you about my pain and my beloved Sing will tell you about his, but we cannot tell you anything about Ash. Only he and Shorter know of the hell they had to endure before my family decided to confront the very boss of the Corse mafia to save them.

Yes, you read well, the mafia was involved in all this and, spoiler alert, all that situation was such a big shit that I guess we all decided to pretend that it never happened in order to be able to move forward.

But you shouldn´t worry so much about Ash or me. As far as I am concerned, leaving America forever didn´t represent a very big sacrifice and I don´t want to go back to China either, there are too many memories of my mother in that place and I still don´t think I can bear it. Besides, Eiji, if I had never come to Japan, I would never have met you and at least something good came out of this fucking situation when we met, don´t you think?

Moreover, although his charming prince face keeps you from believing it, Aslan Jade Callenreese is a tough guy. Don´t be fooled by his maudlin prose, because as far as I know, Ash was able to survive the chaos of hell he was involved in because he hardened his heart and became a real beast.

Now is when I have to say that it worries me a bit. I know that Shorter worked with his demons in therapy but I don´t know if the vain one of Ash, who has always believed that he can get out of any problem alone, did the same. No, it is not that I am mortified to think that he has not been able to overcome the past but if you are as much in love with him as you obviously are already, what will you do if he is not able to look at you in the same way? What will you do if he has lost the ability to love and open up to someone?

Here is another spoiler, Eiji: perhaps hell hurt him so much that he is not even able to imagine the possibility of being a friend (or a lover) for someone else.

I don´t want you to make that abandoned puppy face that you always put on when someone tells you sad things. I cannot stand to see that gesture on your face but you have to know all this, do you understand? I am the one who must tell you because you are always a fool and you have that compulsive need to protect everyone and make them happy without worrying about your own happiness first.

I'll only ask you to be careful, even though you and Aslan seem to get along well, the real Ash is far from being that bright and kind version that he lets you see every day. So try not to get carried away by what´s visible and don´t rush yourself to ask him about this story. Believe me when I tell you that it´s something you do not need to know and it might be better for Ash to keep the demons at bay without mentioning them, without bringing them back to life.

Anyway, dear, you ask me about Shorter and Nadia and I'll just tell you they're nice people. They both run the best Chinese restaurant in the stinking Big Apple, so you have nothing to worry about. Just be careful with Shorter, he likes to flirt with everything that moves and I'm sure he'll do the same with you because he's a bachelor and you, Eiji, are too adorable for your own good.

Try not to be so kind to Shorter, will you? Don´t give him false hope because seriously I am getting more afraid of the possibility that Aslan Jade Callenreese come to ask your hand to Mr. Ibe any day in the future. I would bet my long black hair that the asshole of Ash must have already lost his head for you. That´s better because although I cannot forgive him for having made you fall in love with him, it would have been worse if he were indifferent to how terribly cute you are.

I get chills just by thinking that Ash and you are having dirty things about each other! Gross!

To finish and not continue imagining such terrible scenes, really Eiji, forget about the drama. The same way that nothing I do or say will make you think bad of me, I would be unable to hate you, even if you marry Ash. I promise I will be a good brother-in-law to him. Or maybe not. However, I can try so if I fail miserably, as I surely will, you have to continue loving me too.

Remember that everything that makes you happy will make me happy too. If your happiness is now an American blond with the face of a cheap fairytale prince, go ahead, approach him as a friend or as whatever you want. I also want your project to continue going well. I apologize in advance for I´m not going to be able to phone during this week either.  Everything is too hectic on this side of the world, nothing to worry about, stop thinking nonsense.

I´ll love you forever, Yut-Lung.

P.S. Have you thought about completing the collection for your next exhibition with Ash's photographs? I mean, your subject is supposed to be “passion for life” and I think that since you read his books, you have felt passionate about Ash and his insufferable existence, haven´t you? If you had not thought about it at all, yes I'm a genius. You´re welcome!

 


	17. Subject: ASH?

**From: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**To: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**Subject: ASH?**

 Aslan, where the hell are you?

I know there´s no use in looking for you right now because when your desire is to hide yourself from the whole world, I can only think of a place where you could be. However, the New York Public Library is not open at this hour at night, so if you get to read this e-mail, answer as soon as you can, is that okay?

I haven´t even made the effort to call you on the cell phone because I know you will not answer but I'm worried about you. Actually, Nadia, Eiji and I are worried about you and I must say that Eiji Okumura is the most affected of the three. Although seeing you breaking Eiji's camera into a thousand pieces was completely scary, I want you to know that this is not what has the boy on the verge of a nervous collapse. I really think he is worried about you, he feels guilty for something that  he doesn´t even understand and I cannot help him feel better because Ash, the reasons you had to do what you did belong only to you.

I know you hate people taking photos of you because that's how it all started. The photographs were which brought us hell in that park your brother Griffin used to take us to play in. But Eiji doesn´t know, Ash. He doesn´t know it. For him, taking pictures must be the most natural thing in the world, so try to understand that, would you?

Ash, after dinner today I can say that Eiji really cares about you, there is something in the way he looks at you and the way he talks about you that cannot be explained as mere admiration. The boy feels that you are his friend, or perhaps something else because his eyes look at you with absolute adoration and I think not even what has just happened, has changed anything about his feelings towards you.

And I know that photographs will always bring terrible memories to your mind, and I truly believe that you should talk about it with Dr. Randy as soon as possible. But this is not enough reason for you to move away from the whole world as it is your habit to do when everything is too much to bear again.

Ash, I understand that after what happened at dinner you won´t want to see Eiji because you feel embarrassed but come on, come home. I swear Nadia is about to call Charlie, her boyfriend, to make all the state police begin looking for you and I remind you that the police are not to your liking either.

Please, come home. Let's talk about this. I promise we'll find a way to explain Eiji Okumura what happened. He'll understand, Ash, he doesn´t hate you because that's what you're thinking right now, aren´t you? You think he will hate you the whole life for a reaction that seem to be an exaggeration for the people outside our inner circle. Remember that in your case, it´s more than justifiable, during a healing process you have the right to make some mistakes.

Ash, you're healing and it´s not easy.  There are wounds that take longer to heal than others and this one, the wound that began to bleed due to the photograph that Eiji tried to during dinner, is the one that is most contaminated. Because you still think the cause of your brother's death was the photographs that Dino Golzine took before kidnapping us, don´t you?

But Eiji Okumura doesn´t take pictures to hurt, Ash. Eiji Okumura tells stories with his photographs in the same way that you do with your words and your blank pages. Aslan, you know more than anyone else does that one of the aims of art is to make sense of what is broken. I know you should feel hurt now but remember what I´ve just written above: Eiji didn´t want to hurt you. Eiji simply felt the urge to tell a story in which our laughs and the good time that the four of us were having at dinner, was a memory we could preserve to relive it again in the future.

You're right, Ash, Eiji is completely adorable but now he's really scared. He told me that if I could get in touch with you, I should explain you that a camera is just that, an object that can be replaced. If what worries you is the cost of it, remember that your bank account is not that of a boy without resources so you can repair the damage and none of this has to affect the friendship you and Eiji have now. Eiji will not get away from you after this, I swear.

All you have to do is explain him in the best way you can do that involuntary reactions like this are the result of an old pain, that they are part of your therapeutic process.I know that you want Eiji to think that you are perfect because you care about him. I know you want him to always believe that you are the Ash Lynx without wounds but it´s impossible to pretend you´re the perfect image that all your fans claim you to be.  

Today you showed him your most vulnerable side and that is no reason to be ashamed because he is your friend now. It took me just five minutes to realize that he is more than just your co-worker. You also look at him differently and before he suggested taking pictures, everything was going well. Ash, since we were kids, I have not seen you smile the way you smile for Eiji.

So now that you can take into consideration all that I have told you, I want you to also bear in mind that what happened this night was only a stumbling block on your healing path. I also had many of these ups and downs  and I know that when they happen, you feel that nothing makes sense.  It is easy to think that making the effort to keep on going will never help because the demons will always be on the lookout and guess what, you're right! The demons won´t shut up entirely, they will always be on the lookout but you, the Lynx of New York, the man who could dismantle one of the most powerful criminal organizations of human trafficking and child abuse, you are stronger than that. You just have to remember it.

You just have to think that you are not alone. Eiji will be waiting for you. Nadia and I will also be wishing you to come to us so that we can hold you because there is nothing worse than being alone when these painful things come back to take control of your soul and your mind.Ash, please come back home, or at least answer me and tell me you're in a safe place and that you will not hurt yourself. Please Ash, please don´t hurt yourself in any way, okay? 

With love, Shorter.      

 

 


	18. Subject: I'm  so stupid.

**From: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**To: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**Subject: I'm  so stupid.**

 I just screwed everything up, Yut-Lung.

I wanted to call you but I remembered you're still busy, so I'm going to write you a really long e-mail because I feel like a supreme idiot. If I don´t get rid of all the mess of emotions that seem to be stuck in my chest, I´ll explode.

Truth be told, I still don´t fully understand it but I am sure that I have just lost the amazing relationship I´ve been building with Ash. I feel as if I had been having the most beautiful of dreams and then, just when I least expected it, my dream turned out to be the greatest nightmare I´ve ever had.

That's what happened in summary.  As I look towards the streets of New York City in search of an explanation that I know I won´t find in the dark, I still feel beaten, stunned and there´s  a tremendous desire in my heart to leave my small apartment to look for Ash .

I don´t know where Ash is now. He just ran away from Shorter and Nadia's restaurant and it's my fault, it's my damn fault. But ... why did he behave like that? First, your cousins Ash and I were laughing at everything, mainly at the things that Shorter was telling about his first date with a bodyguard of the state governor who is called Cain Blood.  Then, the minute when I wanted to take a picture to show them all my talent as a photographer, Ash was completely frozen and he looked at me the same way somebody would look at the most despicable cockroach in the universe.

I swear, I felt that everything was happening in slow motion. After Shorter said that Cain and he plan to continue seeing each other, I suggested that maybe I could be his photographer at the wedding. I said it just for fun, I said it because I really liked Shorter. He´s completely nice and fun and his sister Nadia kept saying that maybe Cain would be the right one to catch the unreachable Shorter Wong for good. Joking with them was easy, completely natural. Even Ash said he was sure that my talent shouldn´t be worn away in something as trivial as wedding photographs, photographs of Shorter, which makes things worse.

Everyone laughed at Ash´s comment. I myself felt so comfortable among them, among those three people who had invited me to be a part of their little family for a moment. I was happy to be there, surrounded by the simple happiness that overwhelmed us. I felt that Ash was sharing with me a little world that he had not shared with anyone else. I swear I stupidly believed that I was special to Ash and my heart was filled with warmth at that very moment.

I know that now I´ll  give you reasons to say "I told you so", but maybe, just maybe, I'm starting to feel a thousand things that I shouldn´t. What I  feel for Ash are things that I don´t understand but that definitely are far from my initial admiration. I think I don´t  look at him just like my co-worker, I think that if it continues like this, there will come a point where calling him my friend will not be enough either.

I like Ash too much, Yue, I like him so much that I swear  during dinner tonight I had to make an effort not to blush each time he looked at me or shared one of our private jokes and smiled at me. We have private jokes now and that´s great.  Even Shorter said it looks like we've known each other for a lifetime and not just for a month. Ash and I are real friends now, that's the truth.

That little comment made my heart beat hard, that made me realize that knowing that I'm close to Ash makes me happy. Things like that feed my stupid hopes of being meaningful to him. I wanted to ask Shorter if he really believes Ash and I could be more than just co-workers. He´s Ash´s best friend so he must know things like that, doesn´t he? He must know if Ash does this with all the people he wants to be nice to, or if he really can see me now as something more than the clumsy photographer who asked him to work with him.

Now I feel like I've ruined all this, all that warm world in which Ash and I were laughing together before I screwed up everything.  Why couldn´t I repress myself? Why did I think it would be a good idea to do what I did?

I guess I was just too drunk with happiness. I swear I only had two beers because the conversation the four of us had was much more charming than the effects of alcohol. I could have kept laughing. I could have continued joking with Shorter who was still showing us all the hundreds of photographs he took with Cain the same day he met him. I could have simply lost myself in Ash's laughter, that laugh that seems to come naturally from his lips only when he feels surrounded by loved ones.

I could keep quiet all the damn night and none of this would have happened, but now it's too late to regret it.

“Hey Eiji, are you sure you can take good pictures on the day of my wedding with Cain?” Shorter asked jokingly.

“Do you doubt it?” I replied without embarrassment, and although you warned me that he likes to flirt with everyone, I think it would never have occurred to him to flirt with me, not after the murderous look Ash gave him when Shorter told me that I'm really handsome.

“Well, Ash doesn´t stop saying that you are the best photographer in the universe and I suppose your fame precedes you, but until I see with your work with my own eyes I won´t  be at ease.”

 I laughed like a fool at Shorter´s words because nothing in the universe would have made me feel ready for what came later, nothing in that night had given me clue of anything. My laughs were the last I heard tonight.

After Shorter's statement, I got up from the table to walk to the front door of the restaurant, the place where I had hung my coat and a small bag in which I always carry one of my cameras. I had brought with me that camera that in fact , Sing and you gave me on my birthday. Do you remember that sad birthday when you both insisted on making me understand that staying alive was still an event that was worth celebrating?

Anyway, I took the small camera in my hands and without thinking about anything, I focused the dining room table with it and when I saw the look in Ash's eyes, I knew something bad was about to happen. With an unprecedented skill, with quick movements that really reminded me of a feline, Ash got up from the chair and without waiting for a single second, took the camera from my hands without I could put up any resistance. Everything happened so fast that my brain couldn´t process the fact that later, Ash crashed my camera to the ground as if with that act he was killing something or someone.

His emerald pupils burned with hatred, burned with rage. His eyes were the eyes of a murderer, Yue, and I was a little afraid to see that kind of emotion in his eyes.

“Don't ever do that again, understand? Never!” he told me in a whisper that had the effect of a curse for me.

I kept looking at him like a rabbit would have looked at his predator. I didn´t say anything. My eyes were still fixed on him, and when the first tears came out of my eyes without me being able to avoid them, the hatred in his eyes turned to absolute shame.

You know how I am, Yue, I'm not as tough as you or as Sing. When I feel too many things at once, I cannot do anything other than cry like a child. And at that moment I felt stupid, I felt sad and also hurt because you know everything that camera meant to me: that camera was my beginning, that camera was a reminder that I was able to reconstruct myself at the precise moment I thought it would be better for me to die.

Also, Ash's hatred directed at me was so strong that I guess that was what ended up breaking my heart. Therefore, I couldn´t contain the crying, I couldn´t. Perhaps if I had been strong enough, Ash would not have apologized hastily before leaving the restaurant and getting lost in the dark leaving us, your cousins and me, with a huge void in the chest.

I think none of us said anything about what had happened for at least five minutes. Everything had been too strong, too intense. Nadia took my hand afterwards and wiped my tears with care, with tenderness. She broke the silence with whispers that told me I should forgive Ash and that she and her brother would pay me every penny of the cost of my camera, which remained destroyed in thousand pieces all over the floor.

“Eiji ...” Shorter said when he was able to articulate some words. “Eiji, this ... I swear there's a good reason that explains why Ash did all this but…”

“I understand, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. I shouldn´t do this, all this was my fault,” I said without being able to prevent my words from coming out broken.

“No darling, it was not your fault,” Nadia said in a sweet voice. “It would be better if Shorter takes you home.  I swear that afterwards we will both talk to Ash. Things haven´t been easy for him, Eiji. There are some things that our Aslan is not able to control. Don´t hate him, will you? I know I ask you too much, but when you talk to him again, maybe he will explain everything to you and I know he will want to talk to you again.

“But he hates me...”

"Not you, I swear he doesn´t hate you," Shorter assured me. “Ash hates the past that haunts him, Eiji, that's what he hates but not you. You are someone special to him and I think what happened today was a natural reaction. He is barely healing, Eiji. Someone damaged him so much. I would like to explain everything myself but I cannot, I cannot because that story belongs only to Ash and it's a story that hurts, Eiji.”

“Please tell him that my camera doesn´t matter,” I said without thinking. “Tell him it's just an object.  It’s just something I can replace, that he has no reason to worry.  Please let him know that I´m going to apologize for whatever thing I did.”

“Go home, Eiji” Nadia said with a sincere smile. “Everything will be fine in the morning, is it okay?”

I nodded to Nadia's words but I really wanted to tell her that we should run after Ash. It was true that by that time, the first impression had already passed. When I remembered the pain and quiet sadness that Ash tries to hide, I understood that what your cousins said was true: that reaction in Ash had been more the answer to an instinct than a deliberate attack against me.

And right now, I'm also embarrassed to have made him feel guilty because of my crying. I'm a shame, Yue. I am a complete shame.

I would like to be able to listen to Nadia and trust that Ash will meet them soon but now the worry is eating me down. I feel like going out into the streets of New York even if I have no idea where to go just to look for Ash. I need to know that he's fine, I need to ask him to forgive me for ruining what was undoubtedly a nice dinner.

I don´t even want him to explain anything to me about that past that seems to hurt him this much. I just want to see him. I just want his green eyes to look at me with warmth and not full of hate because I think I cannot bear it again if he gives me another one of those looks full of disdain. I need to see him, Yue, I need to see him now and I need to know he is fine.

You know what? I cannot stand this if I stayed here any longer. I'll go find him. I'll do that. Wish me luck; I'm really going to need it.

With love, Eiji.

 

 


	19. Subject: He found me.

**From: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**To: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**Subject: He found me.**

 

Eiji found me, Shorter.

No, I'm not just talking about a physical encounter, it was something else. Hours ago, while the shadows were covering me again and I was looking to hide from everyone in my lair, as a wounded beast would have done, I really felt I was losing myself again.

If I'm honest, I don´t remember very well how the hell I got to think the huge and empty gymnasium of the University of New York was the right place to hide and so nobody would ever find me. I really didn´t want anyone to find me. I wanted to be alone until I could finally get my shit together.

I screwed it up masterfully, didn´t I? In less than five minutes, I showed Nadia, Eiji and you how fucking broken I´m still inside.

After all I did, although Eiji would do well to hate me after what I did, he managed to find me. I didn´t ask him how he did it. He came to me unexpectedly and he met me. Ours was a real meeting, one of those events in which the other person can see what you are, what you were and even draw in his eyes a picture of what you will be if you dare to keep going.

Ours was an encounter like that because I told him everything, Shorter, or at least everything I could tell him without feeling that I was dying in pain. I told him what I could because he deserved to know and because somehow, the mere thought that he would hate me for what I had done to him, was so painful that when I saw him in front of me, I wanted to explain to him, make him understand why I had behaved like a stupid guy. I wanted to explain my side of the story to him, if he was going to hate me, at least I wanted him to do it after having listened to the whole story.

You know that I hadn´t shared this horror story with anyone. The police officers who rescued us from Dino´s mansion and then, Max Lobo who interviewed us both to write his article, were the only people besides you and me, in front of whom I could talk about all the horrors that we had to endure.

When I finished telling him my story, Eiji understood everything. Can you believe it? I destroyed his camera, he saw me acting like a sick crazy person and he simply comforted me and stayed by my side after hearing my story. He accompanied me home and in fact, he is still asleep on the sofa in the living room because I didn´t have the strength to ask him to leave me alone.

After we talked, he let me sleep in his arms and you know something? It's been a long time since I rested so well. After telling him everything and coming home, I was so tired that I didn´t have the energy to move from the sofa where we both sat down and I let Eiji hold me when I couldn´t help but trembling once again.

When Eiji´s arms surrounded me for the first time, I swear I feared becoming an irrational fool again. I feared to keep him away from me forever because you know how hard it´s for me to tolerate physical contact with another person, especially if this person is a man. Well, with Eiji it was anything like that. I didn´t feel the usual automatic rejection, I didn´t feel like running. I didn´t fear that Eiji wanted to hurt me because you already know what I think of the caresses: no one gives them without expecting something in return, and that something always turned out to be something aberrant, something that would cause us nothing but humiliation and pain.

Nevertheless, Eiji's arms were different. Eiji is different.

He hugged me gently, as if I were an extremely fragile and delicate piece of crystal. In his arms, I was like a child scared of the darkness, in fact I think I haven´t stopped fearing the absence of light yet.  However, being close to Eiji there was no place to fear. He held me up as if his arms had been made precisely to house a wounded beast like me. Eiji's strength has nothing to do with a physical attribute alone yet his strength was wrapping me and reminding me that the past no longer existed. For a moment, Shorter, I swear I thought that if I had survived so much crap it was only because I was destined to be comforted by the warmth of Eiji Okumura. I truly believed if I had survived so many wounds it was because Eiji's arms would be my home to heal.

Of course, I know I don’t deserve Eiji´s compassion, I really know. I understand that perhaps my reasons for having reacted as I did in front of everyone are valid, but deep down I know that what happened had rather everything to do with the fact that I am a complete asshole. However, when I did what I did, I was not really thinking. When I saw the lens of Eiji´s camera pointing towards us, it was as if the horror of my memories took possession of me.

I swear for a single second, it was as if Eiji resembled the form that Blanca, who started everything, had the first time he took pictures of both of us. Blanca also had long black hair back then. Blanca smiled in the same friendly and warm way. Blanca said the photographs he would take were harmless and we believed him.

Back then, Griffin and I were desperate. I was barely eight years old but I managed to understand the great predicament in which my older brother and I were involved. We were both no more than a couple of kids who had run away from a house where they had always been hated. We had both escaped. We were tired of my father's beatings and the abandonment of our mothers. Griffin became my only family then. He had taken a responsibility that no one should take.

I remember that when Blanca found us in the park where my brother used to take us to play, it had been barely a month since Nadia had found Griffin and me digging in the garbage cans of her restaurant. Your sister and you saved us from dying of hunger and gave us a place to live but my brother was proud and he hated to be given charity.

That's why he was desperate, he couldn´t tolerate for another second the idea of being sponsored by your family even though nobody claimed anything from us. I think I also felt in debt to you and to Nadia. That's why, when Blanca told my brother that he was the representative of one of the best children's clothing designers in New York, and that the pictures of a child as adorable as me would undoubtedly leave us a lot of profits, I felt useful. For the first time in my life, I felt I was someone of value and not just a nuisance like our father, Jim Callenreese always said that my brother and I were.

Even I was the one who said that no photograph would be taken unless you were with me in them.  There´s not a single day in my life when I don´t regret having said that, Shorter. Because those photographs were the beginning of everything.

The next day, the monsters came for us. The next day, we were both taken away from the arms of our family. That was the last day I saw Griffin. That was the day when the men of Golzine, the bastard who abused us and sold us to the highest bidder for years, murdered my brother without mercy and wounded Nadia.

The photographs were only the beginning of hell, of all those nights of crying, of all those moments when we begged the pigs that did what they wanted with us to stop without receiving anything but pain or more damage in return.

All those things are still hurting inside me, Shorter and I know it will sound like the most pathetic of excuses, but at the very moment when Eiji pointed at me with his camera it was like seeing Blanca again and hatred took over me. No doubt I should discuss this with Dr. Jessica as soon as I see her, but I swear that's what happened. It wasn´t Eiji who was in front of me, it was Blanca's ghost and I wanted to hurt him.

Actually, I feel a little relieved when I think that instead of hurting Eiji, the only thing I did was to break his camera. Although now I know that in fact I destroyed one of his most valuable possessions, the damage can be compensated in some way.

What would have happened if I had hurt him? I would never have forgiven myself, Shorter. In fact, right now I totally hate myself for making him cry. How was I able to do that?

Seeing him cry because of what I did reminds me that inside me there´s also a monster that knows how to harm. Maybe I'm a demon too, don´t you think? If I was able to hurt a person as beautiful and pure as Eiji, I must also be one of the most terrible demons in hell.

That's why I ran away, so I can hide in the depths of the earth, although now that I think about it, maybe Eiji would have found me there too. I do not know how he was able to know that I would hide in a place as predictable as in the school where we both work but right now I am grateful that it was he who came to me.

However, the moment I saw him in the middle of the gym with his eyes full of worry and his messy dark hair covering his face, I swear I felt like disappearing.  When he took me in his arms, I swear I thought he had gone to find me in order to put me in my place. I kept thinking that he would hurt me, I´m that kind of stupid.

In fact, he just held me tight as if he feared that at any moment I would run away again from him.

“You're okay, Ash, you're fine…” he whispered.  “I was so worried, but you're fine, you're fine…”

He repeated my name with warmth and his arms were rebuilding something in me, I guess the part that memories were destroying again. He was not claiming anything. He had not come looking for me to make me feel like a demon, no. He had met me just because he cares about me.

Can you believe that, Shorter?

Eiji Okumura cares about me; someone as wonderful as him really cares about me.

When I understood that, it was when I started crying and in the middle of my crying attack I told him everything. I told him about my pain in the middle of the solitude of the school gym. I told him about Blanca and about the death of my brother. I told him about the restaurant of Dino Golzine, the head of the Corsican mafia, where he was responsible for satisfying the appetites of the most evil men through the sale of children like you and me.

Don´t worry, I didn´t mention anything about you. I talked about what happened to me only. Eiji listened to me, Shorter. He believed everything I said without putting my words in doubt in the same way as all those people did, those who cannot believe that men are capable of all the atrocities they did to us. Eiji is not like that. He believed me; he didn´t stop holding me all the time.

“Forgive me, forgive me,” he said in a whisper when I finished talking.

“Why do I have to forgive you?” I said. “It's me who should apologize for being stupid.”

"No, don´t call yourself like that, I hurt you," he said, his eyes full of tears, and I swear I hated myself again when I saw him crying because of me. “I made you remember all that, you should have hit me, Ash.”

“Eiji, it's not your fault, I must learn to control myself better...”

“But the world hurt you, they hurt you so much. Ash, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry…”

He kept apologizing and hugged me harder. I don´t know how long we stayed that way, I in his arms, he protecting me. That is what he was doing. He was protecting me from myself and in that instant, an outburst of gratitude filled me to such an extent that I could not do anything but cling to him. That's why I tell you that he found me in that place where I thought no one would ever meet me: he found me in the most complete darkness and that didn´t make him move away from me.

That's why I left him to accompany me home when I regained enough sanity to know that it would not be at all pleasant for someone from the university to find us like that, both of us crying in the middle of the gym. That's why, when we both walked into my apartment, I let him take me back in his arms and I fell asleep in them because I needed to rest and I knew with all my heart that I could trust Eiji, that Eiji would never be able of harming me

And I don´t want to hurt him again either, Shorter.

He is my friend now, he knows what hurts me and what maybe will always hurt inside me and even so, he is still by my side. Eiji cares about me; he wants to take care of me without asking me anything in return. Of how many people can we say the same about? I have never felt anything like this and I know I must be lucky because feeling that I am that valuable to Eiji makes me happy.

And I want him to be happy to know me too so I swear, that after apologizing properly, I´ll buy a new camera for him and I will invest every day of the year that we have left to live together to repair my damage. I will also take care of him and I will take care of myself so that my own pain is not harmful to him.

I don´t want the spring in Eiji to be contaminated with my winter.

I don´t want to wither all the flowers that surely Eiji also had to re-cultivate with effort and overcoming his own gusts of icy wind and snowstorms.

I want to be a spring for him, Shorter, because a new flowering will come to me too if I keep healing don´t you think?

I know I will be able to bring it. I know there must still be flowers inside me.

Love, Ash.

P.S. Forgive me for causing you worry and not answering your messages until now. I'm fine. By the way, Eiji's cell phone hasn´t stopped ringing but I don´t have the heart to wake him up so tell Yue (who else would look for him so hard?) that Eiji is fine too. I still give you problems, Shorter, but I hope to be a better friend from now on for you too.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was very intense to write for me. I think that writing Ash being that vulnerable is not easy. I cried like a baby because drama queen here. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the update and thank you very much for joining me in this story, it makes me very happy to share it not only with silence :)


	20. Subject: You were right.

**From: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**To: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**Subject: You were right.**

 

I can´t help but smile like a complete idiot as I look repeatedly at the picture that Ash just sent me an hour ago. I cannot stop looking at his cheerful smile, a smile that knows nothing of darkness yet.

In the picture, Ash smiles in the arms of his older brother, Griffin, and I can see that this is the only picture that somehow doesn´t hurt Ash.

Actually, I still don´t understand very well why he wanted to show me something like that. I think it was an accident only. Before sitting down to write this email, Ash and I were having a video call, one of our new customs.

He said his therapist recommended doing something to relax before trying to sleep because Ash has been having insomnia problems recently and it turns out that talking to me has a calming effect on him.

Even though he says that about me, I still feel guilty for his insomnia. I know you'll tell me I'm stupid for thinking like that but I know that I was the one who woke up the demons inside Ash, those demons I know the story about now.

When I look at the picture Ash sent me, I cannot help but wonder how sick a mind has to be in order to harm a child. If you could look at him in the picture, maybe you would not hate it that much, Yue. Ash was an adorable child who deserved to have a loving family, a family that was proud of him all his life. Ash deserved a paradise and not the hell in which his life became simply because there are monsters like the ones who damaged him.

I think the memory of all those monsters, memories that I removed at dinner two weeks ago, is what doesn´t allow Ash to sleep. Because the demons come to him and make him remember again and again the suffering of his past, a suffering that must have broken something inside him irreparably.

That night, the night I went looking for him with my heart full of fear, I realized that Ash is not the perfect person I imagined he was. I mean, I know that I had you rolling your eyes for almost two years when I used to tell you about him and how perfect he was before my eyes. However, he is not like that, Yue, in fact Ash is like a precious gem that has been subjected to endless abuse. You can see that the surface is still shining and maybe if you do not look closely, you will never realize that underneath all that shine there are fissures, scars, scratches, traces of all those blows that tried to destroy him and yet could not.

He is still a gem, perhaps a piece of jade that shines under the dawn sun. That's his name after all, isn´t it? Aslan Jade, the dawn that resists shadows, the jewel that has been damaged but never beaten.

 Ash showed me all that that night when I could not contain myself and I held him in my arms as if I believed that my strength would be enough to protect him from that past in which I wasn´t by his side. At first I was scared, of course, because he was trebling when I got close to him. Now I know he reacted like that because something in me was still hurting him.

When I saw him sitting on the gym´s floor, when I saw him with his green eyes lost in the solitude and darkness of that place I could not contain myself. I ran towards him as if my arms had been created to hold him. I ran to him as if something inside me knew that it was my duty and my destiny to protect him.

When he let me hold him, when his own arms got tangled in my back, it was at that exact moment when the revelation came to me: I'm in love with him, Yue, you were right. I'm in love with Aslan Jade Callenreese.

No, don´t be scared. It's not that kind of teenage crush that comes in a flurry of emotion and then fades into your heart as quickly as it came. It is something a thousand times deeper, Yue, so intense that I feel that my heart will not be able to contain all what Ash makes me feel. I only know that I need to be by his side, that I need to continue protecting him. I don´t even care that he never feels anything for me. I don´t want anything from Ash, I don´t need a love story by his side. All I want is to protect him, all I want is to be there when he needs me to remind him how strong and wonderful he is.

I want to hold him in my arms again Yue, and maybe that is the only selfish desire of my heart. I want to feel him close to me again and sing all those lullabies that my mother used to sing for my sister and for me when we were children and we were frightened by stormy nights. If what I feel now becomes into love, however, I want to be strong enough to make my love something free. I want to be Ash's shelter in the same way I was that night when he told me about his darkness in my arms.

I know you´re exhausted of telling me a thousand times that it will be very sad not to be able to make my feelings required, at least not in the way that people expect them to be reciprocated but I already told you, I don´t care. I'm in love with Ash and the only thing I want is help him to heal. I will simply stay by his side and be everything he needs. I'm going to make the darkness not hurt him so much, Yue. If he smiles, I'll smile. If he heals, I will feel happy. If he breaks again then I will be there to hold him until everything stops hurting.

Yesterday I talked to Dr. Jessica Randy. I had to talk to her because I really don´t understand how to help a person who is in a process like Ash's, and she told me that the only thing that the people around a patient should do is being there. You don´t have to do special things, there are no precise and perfect words, you just have to be there.

“The presence and the heart are important,” the doctor told me over the phone. “Mr. Okumura, we are taking care of Mr. Callenreese in each session, he´s making a very big effort to rebuild himself again. It´ll take time, of course and your presence in Mr. Callenreese´s life, as well as the other members of his family is what can make the difference. So be sure to stay close to him, that´s how you can help him the most.”

So I'll do that, I'll be here as long as Ash needs me. That's why when Ash told me that talking to me before sleeping helps him to distract himself from the horrible ideas that attack his mind at night, I started with the pleasant routine of calling him. I don´t say goodbye to him until his eyes begin to close. I never say goodbye to him because I think "goodbye" is the only word I'll ever want to tell him.

Today, for example, while we were discussing the progress of his students in the creation of stories from the photographs of mine, Ash wanted to show me the first chapter of a short novel that one of his students is writing. I saw him get out of bed toward the neat desk in his room where a huge pile of papers was waiting to be checked.

While Ash was looking for the right paper, the pile spilled on the floor and in the middle of the chaos the photograph of him and his brother went flying across the room. Ash forgot the paper after that. With an embarrassed smile, he went once more to his phone and smiling sadly let me see the image in which two boys, a brown-haired teenager and a little blond boy dressed in a baseball uniform, were smiling. They must have been happy to be in each other´s arms. The two smiled at the camera without fear. Both were alive. The two were the only thing that the other had and you could realize all that just by looking at them.

“It's Griffin, my brother,” Ash said calmly. “He was a good brother, I swear.”

“I know, I can see,” I answered. “The baseball uniform fits you well, by the way.”

“I think this photo was taken on the day I ended my sports career,” Ash said laughing with a little more joy. “The truth is that I was too good for the children's leagues, many say that I was a prodigy of the sport and they asked Griffin to look for a team of a higher level than that for me.”

“I believe it, there is nothing in which the great Aslan Jade Callenreese is not good.”

“I could argue about that statement for two hours in a row but I know you will not like it, Eiji Okumura.”

“No, you know I don´t like to hear you say horrible things about yourself.  Your students are the ones who should do that, Ash.”

“My students love me, Eiji. Everyone loves me at NYU. I'm the director Lobo´s favorite one, don´t forget it.”

“Is there a fan club for Ash Lynx, then?” I asked making him laugh. “Why did not anyone tell me? I need to join urgently!

“There is nothing like that...”

“Can I found the club then? I will be a good president, I swear.”

 “No, I do not want you to be distracted from the project by doing something like that. Also, I don´t want to share my partner in crime with anyone.”

“I can be a one-person fan club then,” I said, trying again not to look for more meanings in Ash's last words.

“The last thing I said was wrong, Eiji. It's not that I want you to be always with me and only with me. It was stupid to say that, I'm just saying stupid things.”

“Hey relax,” I replied calmly. “The truth is that the idea of talking about you with others is not so attractive, I would be completely jealous ... that is, because well, you know, the fans always think they know more about you than yourself and…”

"You know things about me that I have not told anyone, not even Shorter," he said with a warm smile that raised my pulse alarmingly. “Thanks for being here, Eiji.”

I smiled at Ash's words, what else could I do? If I kept talking, I would probably have ended up telling him more stupid things and I do not want that. I know he was afraid that after what he told me I would treat him differently, I think he thought that after telling me what he told me about him I would walk away.

Nevertheless, that's what I will not do, Yue. I'm not going away from him. Maybe I should look for a way to stay in America for more than a year; maybe if I talk to director Lobo he can help me. Or maybe I'll take Ash to Japan with me. I do not know, I do not know what the future will bring but I do know one thing: Ash will be there because even though we have to separate ourselves for miles of land and sea I know that my heart will always be with him.

Anyway, Sing called me yesterday to tell me that the two have already solved many of the items in your endless to-do list. I hope that after reading this message you can communicate with me. You will be ready to listen to me talking about my feelings, is not that so, best friend? Remember all the nights when I heard you cry over Sing and the fact that he was an imbecile who would never decide to ask you to marry him.

I know you'll make fun of me but I need you to listen my story. I had never felt something like this before. Ash and what he ignites in my heart is too new for me and although I know very well what I'm getting into, maybe, just maybe, I'm also a little scared of not being a good enough shelter for Ash.

Will you tell me one day how you do to make Sing happy every day of his life? I really could use that kind of information now; I promise I'll keep the secret.

 

With love, Eiji.

P.S. In other not so nice news, I am panicking because I cannot complete the collection of photographs for the next exhibition. Do you think I can use one of your wedding photographs? That one where you are wearing your traditional white suit and your black hair flutters in the wind in the middle of the cherry blossoms has always been my favorite. There is passion for life in your eyes because you are about to make one of your most beautiful dreams come true by joining your future with the life of the person you have always loved. It really is a beautiful photograph. Can I show your beauty to the world, Yue? Be good to me and say yes!

 

 

 


	21. Subject: Of course I'm right!

**From: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**To: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**Subject: Of course I'm right!**

 

You are an embarrassment to the universe, Eiji Okumura. It´s unbelievable that you have just realized your crush is real. You keep giving me disgust, by the way and if it turns out that Aslan also falls in love with you as it will most certainly happen (seriously Eiji, you have to learn to read the subtext of your _friend´s_ words) do not force me to hear about you cloying happiness. If you both are like this now that you are just the moral support or whatever you are for the other, when you finally decide to move to the next level, Ash the asshole and you will be unbearable.

Don´t give me that story of unrequited love, that's what cowards do and you're not one. If you want to write a story with Aslan then do it, take a chance. The man is strong, Eiji and if what he feels (because, breaking news, you really have to be blind to not realize that he also feels something for you) is strong too, then you will have your chance.

A love that is kept in silences does not work, Eiji. I know it's romantic to think about loving someone with the abnegation of a saint and stuff but believe me, if you do not talk about your love it will only rot. Silent love rots and will always hurt you. And I do not want anyone, not even you and your silly ideas to hurt you, could you understand this too please?

Of course I understand very well that for Aslan to realize his own feelings will not be easy either and I cannot blame him. Going through everything he lived must have been terrible. I know I've never told you this, but in order to save him and Shorter, I was in the Golzine mansion just for one night and it was enough for me to know that I was in hell. The guys who came to that house were worse than pigs and now you know Ash was there for years. Definitely Ash has to heal before starting to write a new story by your side but that does not mean it is impossible for him to give you a chance.

Look, I'll probably die for writing this, but Eiji, if Aslan is so important to you that you would be able to stay in the terrible "best friend forever zone”, then do not condemn yourself to that place before time. You can be what Ash needs you to be now but if it happens that being your friend is not enough for him then take your chance.

Eiji dear, you are almost an honorary Lee and let me tell you that although in many respects the Clan Lee is absolute shit, there is something we can do better than anyone: we take the opportunities that are given to us with determination and we do with them the best we can.

So enough drama, dear. Live what you have to live but let yourself be surprised also by the things that the world is keeping for you and believe me, I know that the world still owes you a lot of happiness because you are you, just for that reason.

And why is Sing so happy by my side? Well, because it's me, asshole! Who would not be happy to have me by his side every day of his life? There is no more secret than that, I am fabulous and do you know anything else? I think the fool of Aslan thinks exactly the same about you and if you do not believe me, I'm going to ask Sing to ask Shorter to ask Ash to tell him everything he thinks about you and as soon as he knows I'll come to tell you everything in great detail. Another bright idea from my arsenal, do not you think? ;)

By the way, of course you cannot show my beauty to the world, Eiji! My husband is kind of jealous, you know? I do not think Sing would like to share me with a lot of idiotic Americans. Look for a better idea than that, I know you can do it, you're not one of the best photographers in the world for nothing, are you?

 

With love, Yut-Lung.

 

P.S. DON´T CALL ME NOW! I'll call you tomorrow morning, let's say that now Sing and I have to fulfill certain duties that only HUSBANDS understand and yes, I know it was too much information but we were in celibacy last month, you cannot blame me for I want to end the drought right now. I adore you, do not bother me!


	22. Subject: Curiosity can kill the intimate diary.

**From: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**To: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**Subject: Curiosity can kill the intimate diary.**

Aslan, Sing said he had no idea what was the exact model of the camera he and Yue bought for Eiji years ago. I told you that it was a better idea to take Eiji to the photography store and let him choose for himself. But no, you keep insisting on buying something you do not have the least idea to surprise your ... friend?

Yes friend.

Anyway, what if you just listen to Eiji and forget what happened? I think Eiji has already forgotten it, hasn´t he? Your friendship is going from strength to strength and that is what matters. I'm very glad that it's like that by the way. Eiji is a great guy, Aslan, I must admit that he is extremely good for you.

By the way and I´m not being nosy at all (and I swear that no one asked me to ask you this question) do you really continue seeing Eiji only as a friend? Rumor has it that Professor Callenreese has the biggest crush on the young photography teacher and that we are about to discover what his version of a hopeless romantic will be like.

Before you kill me, it is Max who told Nadia and me the rumors. He came to dinner yesterday and told us that love has hit you so hard, that during the first exam of the school year many of your students could copy during their test because the destroyer Lynx was distracted by the presence of Professor Okumura who was guiding his students in his practical exam in the gardens of the Faculty of Fine Arts.

Come on Ash, your personal journal needs a new entry, you've been unusually absent this last week and although I'm not worried because I know Eiji talks to you every day, I'm already too involved in this story to not want to know how it will continue. So you can be honest with me because you know something? I would love that the new story you are about to write was one where Eiji Okumura is your co-star.

Do not deny me the idea is lovely.

😏😏😏😏😏

Anyway, I´m looking forward to reading your new mail or if not, just come to dinner at the restaurant. Maybe I can finally introduce you to Cain and we can talk all night about Eiji, I swear. I know you want.

 

With love and healthy curiosity for your love life, Shorter.

 


	23. Subject: EIJI

**From: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**To: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**Subject: EIJI**

I bought Eiji an old snapshot camera even when I knew it won´t be a great deal for him. I know that I get carried away by my ignorance although maybe that's not really the case. I think I got carried away by my feelings because well, before going out to look for a new camera for Eiji I had been researching about the best models for a professional photographer at the New York Public Library.

Yes, I'm still a nerd but I do not trust computers so much, Shorter. There's nothing more reliable than a book for me in the universe and it's in the library where I've learned everything I know. It was in one of those books that I found this camera model and it took me only a minute to decide that I had to go and look for it in the first vintage store that I get to cross my path.

I know that for Eiji the process of creating a photograph and revealing it must be a beautiful and complex art, something that I cannot understand at all mainly because I still feel a little anxious to think that someone could photograph me. So it is somewhat embarrassing to ask Eiji to explain me about his arty. You know the torture that it was for me to take the photo for the back cover of my novels and I think this is a fear that I will be overcoming little by little, so you must be patient with me, will you?

However, despite my fears, something in the idea of getting a lasting image in just a few seconds seemed great to me and that's what made me buy that camera for Eiji. I mean, there's some poetry in the whole thing, do not you think? For humans, there are eternities that can be born in a single moment, there are moments that can last indefinitely despite having been created by a single click of a second.

By this moment, I know that you will think that I am evading your main question but it is not like that. You wanted to know what Eiji Okumura is for me and this is my answer: Eiji is an eternal instant made of small moments that will stay to live with me until the day of my death.

As for the fact that I do see Eiji as just a friend now, I still do not have a definitive answer but I do know that something in my heart is changing. I'm changing myself, Shorter.

This last week has been intense for me in my therapy sessions. Even though my fear that Eiji would get away from me once I showed him my true self was unfounded, thousands of fears were still burning inside me. I think that when I exploded the way I did at dinner, I was the one who really scared myself when I recognized in me a beast that still has to heal hundreds of wounds on his skin.

So I cannot give a simple label to what I feel for Eiji but I can tell you that he makes me feel happy. Happiness, Shorter, is also an instant, it is not a destiny, so I can say with complete certainty that every moment I spend with Eiji, is for me a flash of happiness.

I feel fortunate to have found him. He is still by my side despite the fact that I have given him thousands of reasons to flee from me. Eiji makes me happy and for a long time I had come to think that someone like me has no right to feel that way.

Yesterday during our religious call at night I asked him if he was not afraid of me. He delayed at least one second to tell me no. He has seen the worst of me. I let him look at the abyss that I hide inside me and instead of walking away, I feel that the handsome Professor Okumura is the closest person to my heart. Yes, I called him handsome, only a blind man could not realize how handsome he is.

I hope you do not get offended by it Shorter, by saying that Eiji is closer to my soul than anyone has ever been but it is the truth: I feel that Eiji is like the sun of spring. He is the sun that triumphs despite the cold. Eiji is like the sun that makes new flowers sprout in the world after the icy land covers everything. Eiji is the sun that reminds you that nothing in this life is endless even winter or pain. Eiji causes colored flowers to bloom once more in the fissures of my deepest wounds. This is Eiji for me.

My soul is like a road full of fissures and yet, the flowers that I thought dead inside have made their way in the middle of the asphalt thanks to the light of Eiji, everything is thanks to the heat of the existence of Eiji.

In short, defining what I feel about Eiji would be like limit the greatest emotions I have ever felt. In order to talk to you about how I feel about him, a single novel would not be enough, so let me keep thinking about an anthology of eternal instants that I know are coming.

And I know that because today, just a few hours ago, I realized that Eiji can be the beginning of a beautiful story for me if I manage to overcome my fear and decide to jump the abyss to meet him on the other side. Because I'm still afraid, Shorter, because something inside me keeps screaming at me that the man I've become over the years will be a terrible burden for Eiji.

I do not know if Eiji wants to be brave and stay by my side. I myself doubt my own courage and I'm still not sure I want to condemn a person as full of light as Eiji to bear a darkness that may never completely go away from me. That's why I need to keep going, I need to continue to heal and risk myself. I think Eiji is worth it, you know? I think that as you told me at the beginning of this whole adventure, Eiji would wrap me in his wings and teach me to fly with him.

I want to fly with him, that's the truth. Shorter, I would go through hell one more time if I manage to make him want to fly with me. But well, that's something I'll do slowly, I do not want to rush anything and since I really think you're hungry for new information, I'll tell you about the happy moments of today.

You see, I wanted to give Eiji the camera I got for him today and even though the rumors of Max (who apparently will never surpass his facet of being a gossip journalist) are true at least in the part where Eiji and I are an inseparable duo now, today I left my office later than usual.

You know what this time of the year means for me.  The students look for thousand ways to obtain a higher note referring to possible errors in the grade I assigned to them, errors that I did not commit. Because of that, because I had to argue with more students than necessary, I could not meet Eiji at lunchtime and I ended up looking for him all over the campus until some of his students told me that his beloved teacher had decided to do a little exercise with the athletics team of the University.

When I heard that, something in me got completely excited. I mean, if Eiji was with the track team it was because maybe he himself was jumping through the air in the same way he used to when he was an elite athlete.

Without further delay, I found myself running towards the athletic field and was not at all surprised to see that around the place where Eiji was jumping to the delight of his improvised audience, there was a huge circle of students cheering for the young teacher who was giving samples of what surely had been a huge talent of the pole vaulting.

When I saw him fly, my soul felt that peace I felt the first time I saw him.  I must tell you that seeing Eiji fly through the air with determination like a proud bird is a thousand times better live than in a video. Yes, it is true that Eiji cannot rise higher anymore but I think nobody cared about that little detail. Because we were all captivated by the grace with which Professor Okumura flew over the bar and fell with softness and certainty on the dark mattress that received his body with the delicacy of a lover.

I could not help but sigh when I saw him fly, Shorter. I think I stayed still and dazzled and my feet just stuck to the ground a few steps away from where the other observers were. Everyone burst into deafening applause and Eiji thanked the audience for their support with a timid bow that really lit flames of a searing red color in my soul. He has that power, you know? Eiji has the power to make my soul burn with a huge emotion simply by seeing him smile.

But that was not all the reason for my surprise, no: Eiji cut his hair. It was a bit strange to see him with that cut he is wearing now, he looks even younger than before and well, let's not talk about how adorable he looks at the moment. And I know it's pretentious to think like that but he cut his hair for me, he told me. Eiji confessed to me that he did not want to bring any bad memories back to my mind and Shorter, I really had to control myself not to throw myself into his arms and kiss him after he gave me that information.

By the way, confession number two: I want to kiss him at least ten times a day. This desire scares me a little, Shorter, and although Dr. Jessica does not stop telling me that my desire is the most natural thing in the world, I fear that for Eiji a kiss is not enough and if we have to think about what comes after that, well ... I'm not ready. I think I'll never be and that's the part that makes me feel embarrassed the most. I know what I want and I'm afraid of it, how pathetic is that?

Anyway, after I approached him once the fan club left him alone in the middle of the court, Eiji smiled when he saw me and that's when he explained to me about his haircut. And instead of hugging him and kissing him until I forget everything, I simply thanked him and he smiled again with that adorable smile of his that makes me glow inside.

“Short hair fits you well but you should not do it just for my own stupidity,” I said shyly.

“It's just hair, Ash, it will grow back,” he said as he wiped the sweat from his forehead with a small white towel. “Do you really think I look good?”

“Didn´t you realize how all the students looked at you?” I commented without being able to repress myself. “I think you've really ousted me as the most handsome teacher in this faculty.”

"Do not be a liar, Aslan," he said, looking me in the eye. “In this school there is no one as handsome as you.”

I swear to you that my soul rose through the heights when he told he thought I was handsome. That judgment of value that throughout my life has only been repeated over and over again, on the lips of Eiji sounded sincere. Eiji told me that with the convinced tone of someone who comments that the sky is blue. If Eiji really thinks that, I am capable of believing everything.

“I brought you something,” I told him because I did not know how else to respond to his demolishing judgment. “I know it does not look like the one I destroyed but…”

Eiji took the camera from my hands and a sweet smile was drawn on his lips causing the blood of my veins to burn with vehemence. Eiji looked at the camera expertly and I swear that his smile only widened when he looked at it.

“It's a charming model, this is one of the first instant machines, I think,” he said without taking his eyes off his new device, that device that he was looking at as if it were an invaluable treasure.

“Do you like it?”

“I love it but I told you that you shouldn´t buy it.”

“Oh, come on! I do not like to go through life without paying my debts, Eiji. Also, I know that I hurt you by destroying the other camera and that I will never be able to replace it but maybe if you let this also be a new beginning for you…”

"A new beginning?" He said, returning his dark eyes to me.

“Yes, what if you remember this day as the day you taught Aslan Jade Callenreese, a photographic disaster, a bit of your art?”

Eiji smiled and nodded at my words and taking me by surprise, he put the camera in my hands and what happened after that... well, Shorter, I really don´t know how I could control myself to not commit a madness that I would regret later.

Because Eiji stood by my side, he was really close to me. His hands took mine over the camera and Eiji whispered instructions to my ear making me feel chills at his closeness. Once again I was amazed by the fact that I craved her closeness instead of finding it despicable. Eiji's warmth was wrapping me, his perfume made me feel at ease and his hands in my hands were happiness.

When he asked if I had any doubt, I swore him I had understood everything about my first photography class but the truth is that my brain had stopped working at the very moment Eiji's words bounced off my skin. I'm a lost case, aren´t I? I think I now understand why some of my students were able to copy during the first test of the term: the closeness of Eiji makes everything disappear. I was lost in Eiji and you know something? It was great, it was great to lose myself in him.

“I want to take a picture of you,” I told him when I felt able to speak like a rational human being one more time. “Can I?”

Eiji nodded and smiled at me as if telling me he was ready to be my model. I smiled too and pointed the camera towards him. I wasn´t sure of what I was doing but somehow my hands were able to remember the positions that Eiji had put them in to help me capture that image in the best way: the afternoon sun spilling on Eiji's skin, Eiji's smile illuminating everything around him.

When I felt it was time, I simply pressed the trigger and immediately, a small rectangle of paper began to come out from the front part of the camera and for a second I wondered if I had managed to truly capture all the beauty of Eiji and this afternoon in which apparently my emotions clouded my good judgment completely.

Eiji approached me to take the small photograph and make the image begin to clear on the paper with quick and studied movements of his hand. When the final result was ready, I felt a bit embarrassed, but Eiji praised me saying that to be my first photograph I had done a superb job.

“I told you, there is nothing that the great Aslan Jade Callenreese cannot do,” he told me.

“It's good, right?”  I asked with a false modesty that made Eiji laugh.

“It's better than good, you have a natural talent Mr. Callenreese, you´re ready for the second lesson, actually…”

“Can I keep my first photograph then?” I asked Eiji a little desperately.

Yes, you caught me, Shorter: I just wanted to have a picture of Eiji just for me.

“It will be an honor that you keep this photograph, don´t forget to give credit to your teacher.”

“I'll write a novel about this day and this smile, Professor Okumura,” I said without thinking and Eiji's cheeks filled with blush. “And in return ... do you want to take a picture of me someday?”

I will never understand how those words came out of my lips so naturally. Even now when I write them, I know that I said that to Eiji with all sincerity. He looked at me deeply for a long time, as if he feared he had not heard me well and then he just nodded and smiled charmingly before telling me it was time for dinner and that day he would invite me to eat at his house to thank me for the gift I had brought him.

The dinner was great too, I could get you bored with the description of our laughter, our jokes and all the things we said but I'm not such a bad friend. You just need to know that a few hours ago I was happy and that in fact, I am still happy now because Eiji is in my life and everything seems less difficult if I think that Eiji will be here tomorrow too.

In summary, Shorter, yes, Eiji is more than a friend: Eiji is the one who will bring spring to me.

With extreme love, Ash.

 P.S. And since I know that you will definitely share this information with Sing and that this will undoubtedly reach the eyes and ears of a certain mad snake, it is better to clarify that I will not harm Eiji although it would be better if you told Yut-Lung to take care of his marriage instead of getting into the lives of others.


	24. Subject: Darkness and stars.

**From: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**To: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**Subject: Darkness and stars.**

 

It's the second time I sleep at Ash´s home and I still feel like an intruder. I know I shouldn´t say that because Ash himself is the one who has called me to be by his side but even so, I am still intimidated by the fact of being here.

The blackout that submerged New York in complete darkness a few hours ago has finally been solved and Ash´s sleeping peacefully in his bed. In fact, it has been only an hour ago since he got to sleep, he fell asleep while holding my hand.

I cannot help sighing like an imbecile when writing the above, Yue. Ash Lynx, the Ash whom I am in love like a schoolboy is in front of me and he looks so beautiful that he takes my breath away. I feel inside my heart the enormous need to touch his serene face just to make myself sure he is real but I can´t do that.

I do not want to be another person who has touched him without his consent. I cannot be like the others. Ash doesn´t need that. Yes, he asked me to stay by his side tonight and I´ll do that. I´ll stay here. I´ll be a guardian angel for him and nothing else.

He didn´t have a really good day today, after all. I think Halloween is not his favorite festivity if I´m honest.

 Personally, you know that I am a fan of this celebration although until today I had never seen it with my own eyes. There is something special in the atmosphere during today. Everything seems to have a festive air. My students did not stop talking about the costumes they would wear and the various parties they could sneak into tonight.

All of New York seemed to be partying. There were decorations everywhere, it was as if the entire city had been covered in pumpkins, black cats and the smell of candy that seemed to float in the air.

Even Principal Lobo had proposed that the teachers wear a costume and I joined the idea with enthusiasm. I was a sorcerer. I bought a pointy hat, a black cape and pretended to join the excitement of the university with enthusiasm. Other teachers also joined the idea, almost all of us did, except Ash, of course.

When I saw him arrive at his office wearing his usual elegant designer clothes, I felt a bit ridiculous because of my disguise, although he smiled when he saw me and told me that I lacked too much malice to be an actual frightening sorcerer.

“You are too adorable to scare someone, Professor Okumura ...” he said with a funny smile.

“You come disguised as a student nightmare?” I asked mockingly. “So it's true that your students already fear you enough that you don´t need to wear a costume…”

 “I come disguised as an adult man who hates Halloween, although I like your idea more.”

“You're a party pooper, Ash.”

 “Come on, Eiji, this is an idiotic holiday. I bet you that not half of the students understand the spiritual background of the celebration. Also, I hate pumpkins with all my heart,” he said and I swear that his nose wrinkled at the thought of pumpkins.

“So pumpkins are your weak point, Professor Callenreese.”

“No, I just detest them with all my soul.”

I must admit his confession made me laugh, Yue. I swear I thought he was joking, but it turns out that Ash's disdain for the pumpkins is real. As real as the panic that attacks him whenever he´s in the dark.

I think I kept bothering him with his fear all day. I was even stupid enough to buy him a slice of pumpkin pie at lunch and even though he only threatened to give me a huge jar of mustard for Christmas (I hate mustard, Yue , it's disgusting) I think I was really hurting him.

But how would I know? There are fears that one believes are more similar to a joke. That's why I kept laughing at Ash. Also, he laughed with me about some of the things I said but now I feel really stupid about all this. Because I should have known better than anyone that Ash's fears are deep and that they have many faces.

I'm really an imbecile Yue, but sometimes I tend to forget that behind the light of Ash's green eyes there are still a thousand obscurities he is facing. Yue, I boast of wanting to protect him and yet, I think it's me who helped bring about his crisis a few hours ago.

The blackout that suddenly covered New York occurred while I was already asleep. Although several of the older students kindly invited me to some of their parties, I had declined the offers because I am exhausted. This week I was finally able to complete my collection of photographs for the exhibition. The good news is that I will not share your beauty with anyone (Sing already wrote me a pretty illustrative message about what will happen to the poor Japanese photographer if he dares to share the beauty of Sing´s beloved husband with mortals, thank you). The bad news, at least for you, is that I followed your advice and completed my collection with photographs of Ash.

I still do not show them to him, by the way, and I will not show them to anyone without Ash´s permission but I can tell you that they are two of the most beautiful photographs I have ever made. Not even your hatred for my model will prevent you from accepting that I have improved a lot with the art of photography. These two images, Yue, are the masterpiece of my career and I am not exaggerating.

Anyway, I think I can show you the result once Ash approves my idea. For that reason and for the other pending chores is that these days I´ve been feeling drained. I have been busy evaluating also the progress of my boys with respect to illustrate the stories of Ash´s students and I´ve found that there are photographic collections that deserve several recognitions. Maybe at the end of the year, Ash and I will be able to win the award for the best project, our students are this kind of wonderful. And to top it with a cherry, I've started to monitor the progress of the Brooklyn gallery's arrangements.

That's why the least I wanted was to get into a party of noisy college students.

After calling Ash and making sure he would have a good night's rest, I took a shower and went to my bed. I swear that as soon as my head touched the pillow, I fell asleep on the spot.

It was the insistent sound of my phone that ended up waking me up which seemed seconds later to me and when I saw that Ash was calling me, I felt a bucket of cold water fall on my head for no apparent reason. I guess my soul felt something was wrong. I guess something in me is able to know exactly when Ash needs me to help him fight the shadows.

“Eiji, come, please come,” he asked me with his voice filled with fear. Ash spoke as if he was just bearing the punishment of an especially sadistic executioner.  “Eiji, no ... I'm not fine, I…”

“I'll be there with you in ten minutes, please, do not move from your apartment, okay? Ash, I'll be with you in ten minutes.”

Before he could answer me I was already taking my wallet and an old Nori-Nori sweatshirt to go outside. I'm sorry Yue, I know how much you hate that sweatshirt but in that moment I did not care about my null sense of fashion. In that instant, the only thing that mattered to me was getting to Ash. I ran like crazy to the avenue outside my apartment and I think it was a miracle of all the gods of Izumo, my birthplace, that I could find a taxi almost immediately.

It was then that I realized that the streets of New York were completely dark, the only illumination came from the lights of cars and some pumpkin lanterns arranged at the entrance of some houses. The driver was the one who informed me of the blackout and my heart started to beat with more anxiety when I remembered that Ash had mentioned me before how darkness always made him feel panicked.

When I arrived at the place where Ash's place of residence was, I paid the taxi driver and without waiting any longer, I ran to the huge and luxurious penthouse in which he lives alone since his first novel, "Banana Fish", became a super sales success. Ash lives in fact in one of the most expensive parts of the city and at that moment I had to curse the fact of having to take the elevator to the twentieth floor of that luxurious building.

But I had to get to him, that's what I had to do. As soon as I was in front of his door, I entered the key he had given me some time ago and I did not have to walk very far to meet the figure of Ash curled up in the darkness of the room.

I swear that my body ran towards him with all the force of gravity. Ash was still in fear of the shadows but I knew he was not well. I knelt in front of him and slowly took his hand.

“Eiji,” he whispered and his fingers trembled at the touch of my hand.

“I'm here.” I whispered too, I was so scared to make his fear worse but I had to be close to him.

“I hate darkness, I hate it.”

“Can I hold you?”

He nodded and I could see his broken face in the darkness since, by that time, my eyes had become accustomed to the lack of light.

I covered him with my arms without saying anything else while remembering the recommendation of Dr. Jessica. There is a time in which _being_ with a person is something more than just occupying the same space. So I concentrated on letting Ash know that I was with him. My body, my soul, everything I am were with him.

Almost without noticing, my hands began to move rhythmically on his back and he let the air that he was surely containing, come out in the middle of a relieved sigh that made my own heart felt some peace as well.

There, in the middle of the darkness, I was just a boy in whose arms was another boy that made me want to be strong enough to always protect him. Yue, at that moment I felt that we were Ash and Eiji against the universe and when I felt Ash´s breathing over my own heart, I thought that if we were together, we could really defeat anything. That hug was enough to illuminate the dark sky. Our closeness was in fact capable of summoning the creation of a whole new universe of light.

It was at that time that I started to sing to him, I sang one of the songs that my sister used to hum in the mornings. I sang to Ash not because I was sure I had the best voice in the universe but simply because I wanted his heart to stop beating in a frightened way. I wanted to reassure him so I sang to him:

_At first I thought you were a constellation._

_I made a map of your stars then I had a revelation._

_You´re as beautiful as endless._

_You´re the universe I´m helpless in._

I guess my song was a shy confession of my feelings, I know. Among the thousands of songs that I could sing for him, that was the first one that came to my mind. Because that's Ash for me, because he is without a doubt the brightest star in my universe now. I think he always was this meaningful for me somehow, doesn´t he? Ash has been part of my life even though his books were the only part of him that was close to me.

“Am I a star for you?” he asked when my voice was lost in the silence of the room.

"More like the whole universe ..." I said, the words came out of my lips so naturally that I did not even have time to regret.

“Am I like that because I am full of black holes and darkness?”

"Maybe, but the universe is not just darkness, Ash. There is also light and new stars to be born inside you.

"You should be a writer," he said, and I felt the light return to New York City just because of the smile that appeared on Ash's lips when he looked at me.

“I'm learning from the best,” I said and arranged a lock of blond hair that fell on his forehead.

“Don´t you get tired of seeing me like this?” he asked suddenly. “I hate that everyone knows that behind my facade I am no more than this. I'm weak, Eiji, it's amazing that the darkness keeps doing this to me. One day I'm going to break up in such a way that I know I'll scare you. Aren´t you afraid of me yet?”

“No, and I will not.”

"You say that because I have not told you everything," he whispered and a chill ran down my back by the icy tone with which he had made his statement. “I should tell you.”

“No Ash, you shouldn´t.” I said calmly.

"I hate darkness because Blanca used to lock me in a dark basement for days if I did not do what Golzine wanted," he said and his body tensed at the mention of those two names that in his story only meant pain. “When I was a child, it was easy to scare me but when I grew up I started to disobey them. They knew that darkness was my greatest weakness, I hate to admit it but I ended up begging them to take me out of the basement. I know that what they did to me doesn´t make you feel scared, Eiji, but what I did, what they forced me to do ... I did horrible things, I did terrible things, Eiji, I did them because the fear of their punishments was too big. I did it because I have always been weak.”

“We have all done horrible things, Ash,” I said trying to comfort him. “And what those people forced you to do is their fault, just theirs. I will never be afraid of you, I swear, I'm not afraid to swear this to you. Ash, you're my friend and I don´t care about your past. Who you are now, who is here with me, he is the person that I admire and want to always take care of. And it's not just that, Ash, it's not just that.”

“You're too good for me, Professor Okumura. If you aren´t afraid of me, can I tell you another secret?”

“All the secrets you want.”

“You are the most beautiful thing that has happened to me in life, Eiji. I do not want to lose you. Stay by my side Eiji, I do not ask forever, just stay with me today,” he said and my heart was filled with heat upon hearing him say my name and that secret that made a thousand colors explode inside me.

“Always Ash, I'll stay here with you always.”

And I know that my words were true, Yue. Never in my life have I said anything with such confidence. Somehow, I will find a way to fulfill my promise. Somehow I will continue to make what I feel for Ash help the stars in him shine again. Because he is wrong to say that I will be afraid of him. Nothing in this life is only black and white, in all human beings there is darkness and I also had to fight with mine years ago so I know we can overcome it.

I've promised Ash _forever_ and I'll keep my promise, Yue, you know I never make a promise just because. The place where Ash is, that is my place now and being in front of him, watching him sleep and protecting his dreams, maybe that was the true mission of my life.

By this point, maybe I've already killed you with a diabetic coma but I know you can handle it. I had to tell you all about this, Yue. I had to tell you that Aslan Jade Callenreese occupies my whole heart now. That's the truth, Yut-Lung, it's the most beautiful truth I've ever said.

 

Love, Eiji.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song Eiji´s singing is "Venus" by Sleeping at last.


	25. Subject: Do me a favor.

**From: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**To: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**Subject: Do me a favor.**

 

Dear Eiji:

Do me a favor.

Do yourself a favor.

Actually, do this favor to the whole human race.

But especially do this favor to the insufferable Aslan Jade Callenreese and the next time you see him, take him in your arms, look him in the eyes, tell him that you love him and for all the Izumo Gods’ sake KISS HIM until your lips ache.

With love and coming back from the grave after my diabetic coma, Yut-Lung.

 

 


	26. Subject: Magic.

**From: ashlynx @ gmail. com**

**To: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**Subject: Magic.**

I think I'm dreaming, Shorter and I don´t want to wake up. I want to stay in this dream forever. I want to freeze time and stay here, right at this moment for all eternity if there is one.

I would say that I am happy but it is more than that because I feel magic inside me, there is no other way to describe it. I feel that I´m made of magic. I´m made of light, made of fairy dust, damn it!

I would like to shout all over New York that I am happy, that never in my damn existence had I felt this way. All the sadness and all the pain that I had felt throughout my life today are completely silent. There is silence inside me, a sweet and blessed silence that I know will not be eternal but now that is what matters least to me.

Shorter, who would say that a kiss from Eiji Okumura could condemn my demons to a full day of silence? Yes, you read well, you read perfectly well: I kissed Eiji Okumura, I kissed him today and I hope to be able to kiss him again a thousand times during my whole life.

Kissing him was so sweet, Shorter, so warm and comforting. His lips are as soft as all of him, his mouth tastes like green tea and joy; his lips on my lips are one of the most pleasurable sensations I've ever had. I kissed him because I think words were not enough to let him know everything he means to me. I kissed him because I could not contain myself anymore. It was no longer possible, I could not take it anymore. I kissed him because in his eyes I could read the desire to be kissed too and when his hands rested on my waist and I pulled him closer to me taking his face in my hands, I knew that this was our destiny.

And maybe I'm being naive, maybe I'm letting myself be carried away by the happiness that vibrates in each of my cells but as it happened in that moment, right now I'm not afraid either. Yes, I know that with this kiss I have started to write a story with Eiji and I don´t fear that story. Because it's Eiji, just because of that, because I know that Eiji would never hurt me, because the warmth that was on Eiji's lips was like a promise of healing. There is something in him that will help me heal faster. Eiji´s lips are a balm, Shorter, maybe his lips are that medicine with which I can forget my scars. Eiji is a happy place for me. Eiji is my shelter.

For God´s sake! Why did I wait so long to kiss him?

I had not even planned it. When this afternoon he invited me to accompany him to check out the art gallery where next month he will present his new collection of photographs, I was not thinking of giving life to a romance. The truth is that I accompanied him to that place because I love seeing him talking about those things he loves doing and when he talks about photography, his face lights up completely. Eiji talks about photography with the same kind of emotion that people use to talk about the love of their lives and I love seeing him smile like that. So that's why I followed him, although right now I think that when it comes to him, I could go to the end of the world to find myself by his side.

“There's something I want to show you,” he said while we were in the taxi heading to one of the most exclusive art galleries in Brooklyn.

“What´s the matter?” I asked calmly.

“It's a surprise but promise me you won´t get mad at me for doing what I´ve done,” he answered with flushed cheeks.

“Do you really think I could get mad at you?”

“Maybe this would be a good reason for you.”

“What did you do, Professor Okumura?”

“Let's say, mmm, well ... it's better if you see it and then you´ll decide if you want to punch me in the face or not.”

I laughed. Eiji sounded so ashamed and his shy attitude was making me feel dizzy. Everything in Eiji makes me feel like that. Everything in Eiji makes me feel weak but not in a bad way. Weak in the sense of knowing that I would be able to do anything to keep him happy, so that his dark eyes can smile forever, those eyes that despite having the same color that the absence of light don´t scare me.

 When we finally reached the gallery, Eiji fell into a nervous silence that made him look at least three years younger and I felt a little uneasy seeing photographic materials everywhere. The huge gallery in which Eiji will present his work is still a complete disaster. The whole place smelled of fresh paint and remodeling materials. The pictures of Eiji were still covered by several layers of plastic to pack and I was suddenly curious to know what those pictures were like.

Eiji had told me that the subject of his exhibition is the passion for life and suddenly I found myself wanting to know what things were the ones that ignited the passion inside Professor Okumura´s heart. I smiled at the thought of it and when Eiji led me to what appeared to be a large office, which I believe was the only neat room in the gallery, I knew that my favorite photographer would tell me more about his collection.

“I need you to look at two photographs,” Eiji said after asking me to stand next to him in front of two huge canvases that without a doubt were holding two of the images in his collection.

“Do you need an expert opinion about the quality of your photographs?” I asked feeling a little nervous without understanding the whole reason. “Because if so, I'm afraid you´ve just asked the wrong person.”

“No, is not that. Ash, I want to show you the two best pictures I've taken in my life.”

“I love that Professor Okumura doesn´t give a damn about false modesty,” I said with sincerity. “But why do you need me to look at them? If you think they are the best pictures you have taken in life, nothing I say will affect your decision to share them with the world.”

“No Ash, you're wrong. What you think is what matters most to me about these two photographs,” he said and I swear that his voice trembled.

“Why, Eiji?”

“Because they´re pictures of you,” he said and I think my heart stopped a full second when I heard him say that. “I took them because you told me that I should take a picture of you sometime but I didn´t want to make you go through unnecessary stress by telling you what I would do so, I know that this was also wrong and I understand that you hate me now but ... do you want to see them?”

I nodded to Eiji's words because at that moment I wasn´t able to say anything. No, I was not upset, actually I think I still felt curious. Besides, it was true that on that day when I gave Eiji the camera of snapshots, I asked him to take a photograph of me sometime. He had not done anything wrong, my silence was because no one had ever considered me worthy enough to be transformed into a work of art.

Eiji walked towards the first painting and with great care, he unveiled the canvas in which an image of me was engraved on paper with such mastery that each of the details of my classroom seemed to have been captured: there I was, surrounded by students and of books, smiling in the middle of the room while holding in my hands "As I lay dying" by William Faulkner. Even the fact that the book is a first edition is obvious in Eiji's photography. There is such care in his technique that it seems that the light that enters through the windows lands directly on me and that it moves later to the figures of my students. What surprised me most is that a serene smile is also drawn on my lips, which means that Eiji was able to capture the fact that I love teaching, that teaching is as passionate as writing for me. It's a beautiful photograph, Shorter. It is a photograph that without a doubt, Eiji made for me with love.

“Well,” I said when I was able to speak.

“Do you hate me?” he asked with anguish and I smiled to reassure him.

“No, I don´t hate you. Actually I want someone to give you a prize for being able to capture images like this.”

“Do you like it?”

“It's beautiful, really beautiful.”

“Thanks, Ash, it all has to do with the model actually.”

“I doubt it, but the model feels flattered. The second picture is equal to this one?

 “No,” Eiji said and his cheeks colored completely red once more. “Ash, the next picture is, well, I think it's one of a kind.”

My heart beat again when I heard him say that and when his hands unveiled the new picture, I swear that my breath was taken away instantly. Eiji's photography really is unique. The person that is drawn in the photograph is me, but it is also someone else: the Ash of that photograph is the Ash that Eiji looks at every day when my figure is reflected in his eyes.

The composition of the image is simple: I am sitting on the window sill while the sun comes pouring through the glass. I know it's the first hour of the morning because I'm dressed in a simple white cotton shirt and those frayed pants with holes in my knees that I wear to sleep. One of my bare feet touches the floor and the other leans on the window with self-confidence. One of my hands is on my knees, and my face rests in that place. My eyes are closed, I think Eiji took that photograph weeks ago, maybe on that morning when I invited him to breakfast at home earlier than usual. If you think about it like that, it's not an image of the other world but you have to look at it, Shorter, nothing I say can do justice to Eiji's talent, my words will never reach to write a story good enough for that photograph.

“It is called _dawn,”_  he said approaching me slowly. “It's what your name means, right?”

"Yes ..." I whispered, still caught by the magnificence of that image. “Eiji, I…”

It was at that precise moment that all the words inside me went to hell, Shorter. At that moment while my green eyes met Eiji´s gaze, it was when I understood that in the universe there was no language with the necessary words to tell Eiji what that photograph was making me feel or that it was not really about the photograph but of the person who had taken it.

In that instant Shorter, I knew I was more than in love with Eiji Okumura. When my eyes and his eyes met in the middle of that solitary room, I knew that my whole heart was beating for the existence of Eiji Okumura. I also knew that a wounded heart like mine is capable of feeling love because that is what I feel, Shorter, I feel love. And for a person who was told that he would never feel anything other than hatred and rage, feeling love seemed a magical trick.

Some people say that magic is to create something from nothing. Magic is to make nothing stop being only a void. Well, the eyes of Eiji Okumura, the eyes that looked at me daily and which had compared me to the sunrise in an image, were there in front of me and I wanted to let him know that no one had ever looked at me like he did. I also wanted to tell him I liked being that person I saw in his eyes. Because the Aslan of his eyes was loved. Because the Aslan of Eiji's gaze was no longer condemned to loneliness because he would always be by my side. I knew all that when looking at his eyes Shorter. I knew it as one who looks at the sea knows that it consists of waves and foam. I knew it as one who looks at the moon on a dark night knows that there is no need to fear because even in the deepest gloom there is light. I say I knew it but I must say that I felt everything in each beat of my heart.

I love Eiji Okumura. Maybe I loved him without knowing him from the first moment his eyes fell on me.

When that truth came to life inside me, I just smiled and without thinking about anything else, I took a courageous step up to him and taking his face in my hands, I put my lips on top of his gently. Eiji trembled when he felt close to me and I heard a sigh escaping from his half-open mouth that miraculously seemed made to fit mine perfectly.

Several seconds later, his hands rested on my waist and I let everything happen, I let his sweet lips merge with mine. I lost myself in his kiss, Shorter, I lost myself in that huge feeling that sheltered me because Eiji's lips on mine were a real caress, a caress that made me feel protected, worshiped, adored. Eiji's hands were also touching me and I did not feel fear. Because it's Eiji, because it could not be anyone other than Eiji. I do not want him to be anyone other than him, really.

So I kept kissing him and he kissed me. He kissed my lips, but also my whole soul. He was creating thousands of stars in my universe full of darkness. Eiji was creating constellations and planets with his lips. Eiji was a creative force and I think that to the beat of our kiss, we both started to write our own masterpiece, the one that will speak about me and him.

My first kiss was perfect, Shorter. And yes, this is my first kiss, this is the only kiss that someone has given me with love so that is the only one I want to remember.

What seemed like an eternity later, our lips parted simply to take a breath but I embraced Eiji's body and he took me in his arms tightly, as if he wanted nothing in life to move me away from him. We were both in the exact place where we had to be, that place where the other's arms were, that was our home.

“I'm sorry, but I had wanted to kiss you for months,” I said hiding my face on his shoulder.

“Can I take this kiss as your permission to show the world your pictures?”  He asked me and I separated from him just enough to look him in the eyes.

“No, of course not,” I said making him look at me in a surprised way.

“So this is a no?”

“No, what I mean is: do you want to take this kiss as: Eiji Okumura, do you want to stay with me forever? Do you want to be my boyfriend even though I really have no idea how to do something like that? Do you want to let me try to make you happy? Do you want to stay with me even though I am not perfect and I will surely make you suffer because I am too broken and…”

“I'll stay with you always, I told you,” he said putting one of his fingers on my lips to silence me. “I'll take care of you every day, so let me make you happy too, all right?”

“Yes,” I said, still smiling. “And you can show those photos to everyone, tell them that your boyfriend could be a super model if he wanted to.”

"Yes, but after this I will not share my Aslan with anyone," he said and I swear that my knees turned to jelly when I heard him say _my Aslan_. “I think I understand Sing a little bit more now.”

“Your Aslan.”

“My Aslan.”

“My Eiji.”

“Your Eiji forever.”

I kissed him again when I heard him promise me an eternity and after that I kissed him a little bit more. I think my lips are swollen now because of so many kisses and truth be told I think I would have kissed him the whole night if I could have the chance.

Do you understand now why I feel magical?

I have a love for me, Shorter, a love that is mine and that is from Eiji, a love that is Eiji in reality. This is the happiest feeling in the universe, isn´t it? There is a boy who really cares about me, a boy for whom what I am is enough. That boy looks at me with love, that guy thinks I'm a victorious dawn, a dawn full of light. And do you know something? In his arms I am able to feel that way too. In the arms of Eiji Okumura, I am the best version of me.

With love, and waiting for you to prepare a romantic dinner for Eiji and me, Ash.

 


	27. Subject: Planning your wedding banquet.

**From: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**To: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**Subject: Planning your wedding banquet.**

 

FINALLY!

I thought I would become old before reading that you have finally done your best to approach the realization of a new dream, Aslan.

Of course I will make a celebration dinner for Eiji and for you. Is it OK for you both if we have dinner tonight? I will not accept a no answer, so you and Eiji have to come tonight to tell Nadia and me about your love confession and stuff (dirty details included because I reiterate, I'm the intimate diary).

I would have loved to introduce you to Cain too but my lovely boyfriend has had to fly to Washington with the governor so your Eiji and you will be tonight's stars. I´m dying to see you both being the sweetest couple in the universe, God! Everything looks so good in my mind!

For now I will dedicate myself to prepare a superb dinner because you deserve it. Spring has begun to appear in your soul once again, isn´t it? New flowers will be born, Ash, and new life should always be celebrated so we will celebrate with food and drink wholesale.

I'm so happy for you that I think I'm going to get cheesy and I´ll start planning your wedding banquet. Why not? I would love Eiji to be your life partner forever and he likes that word, right? He is not afraid to promise something like that and I admire him and respect him for that.

Anyway, do not let him go. If you feel this happy, stay with him through springs and winters because yes, there will be more winters but when you share them next to a person who warms your soul with its light and heat, the cold outside is what matters least.

Enjoy the new stage of your trip, Aslan. Nobody deserves more this happiness than you.

 

With love and ready to be your best man, Shorter.


	28. Subject: Be happy for me, Yue.

**From: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**To: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**Subject: Be happy for me, Yue.**

 

My dear Yue:

I have been floating in a pink cloud of happiness for a week and I do not know when I´ll have to put my feet back on the earth, maybe never again. You know that I've always liked flying anyway, but this time, Yue, I'm not flying alone.

Ash, my Ash flies with me and every time I take his hand or hold him in my arms tightly, I feel like the luckiest man in the universe. Because Ash chose my arms to rest on them. Because Ash lets me protect him and what I feel for him only grows and grows inside my chest. Ash makes me feel like I've found a home forever. Ash is that sky that I will never want to leave.

Everyone knows now, that he and I are together. I think it would have been impossible to hide it because what Ash and I feel is a lot like spring, you know? There are buds everywhere. There are flowers born in every space of my soul. I´m a garden full of blooming wherever Ash touches me with his timid fingers and soft lips.

I know you will tell me that I am disgusting but since our first kiss I have become addicted to his lips. He kisses me calmly, I know it must be hard for him to let go and I have to be careful not to hurt him. I do not want to hurt him, Yue, I do not want my love to become a burden for him.

I must learn to love him slowly, I know, and there really is no rush in me. A few days ago, I did not even have the hope of knowing what a kiss of his would be like and now I know it and it is the most beautiful thing in the universe. Because there is no fear in Ash´s kisses. Because I know that flying with me was not such an easy decision for him and for that reason, every little thing he wants to give me is an infinite gift. Even though he calls me his boyfriend, I will keep looking to be what he needs and in a mysterious way he needs me right now. Ash needs me to be his home and I will be that. Ash needs me to fill him with kisses and I'll do that.

Ash needs to feel loved, Yue, and I will love him unconditionally until my heart stops beating as it whispers his name. I will live my life by his side and I have no doubt that it will be so. I know that for human beings, there is only the certainty of death but before that there is so much life. It is that life that I will fill with flowers, it is that life that I will share with Ash.

And yes, my friend, I've become a cheesy man and I could not care less. These last days after our first kiss, I have mainly dedicated myself to smile like a fool, to think of Ash twenty-five hours a day and to kiss him again slowly a hundred times before wishing him good night.

By the way, I think I will move to Ash´s apartment next week. I spend more time with him than in my apartment so even though you think I'm going very fast, it's really a necessity.

Dr. Jessica has told me that it is a necessary step especially because Ash will be accompanied now. For the phase of the treatment they are going through, it is convenient that Ash has a companion at night which is the time of day when he becomes more vulnerable to ghosts. So as soon as I manage to move my scarce belongings to Ash's home, I will live with him for the remainder of the year.

Do not worry, I know we had agreed that when you came to New York, you and Sing would share with me the apartment as in the old days. However, I will look for a lovely place for Sing and for you, I can do it in two weeks because this won´t destroy our friendship, right?

Yue, are you going to come to my exhibition in two weeks as you promised? Please tell me yes. I was so blinded by my own happiness that I never thought about how the news that Ash and I are together would affect our relationship. Because joking about this possibility is one thing but now that it is real, how do you feel about it? I would like to know all that and I would like it even more if you could feel happy for me. Yut-Lung Lee, even if you hate my boyfriend, do you think you can feel happy for your beloved Eiji right now?

I swear, my life has never been so bright, Yue. My life had never seemed like a real gift to me. I walk the streets of New York feeling like the owner of the entire universe. I feel magical and powerful because only magic can explain the fact that Ash has chosen me to be with him.

And that is what most makes me happy, that he chose me, that I am the first person he has chosen to share all those things that the world stole from him. Yue, I'm the love he chose and every time I think about it, I cannot help jumping out of happiness.

Yes, yes, I know I must try to calm down because I must also consider the other part, all those difficult days that we still have to face, all those things that Ash and I will have to keep fighting because love cannot win against everything. I know, Yue, I know that my love will not heal Ash overnight, it would be too beautiful for something like that to happen.

But he and I are not a complement, he and I are not the other half of the other. Ash and I are two individual beings whose paths have coincided in the same place despite coming from completely different worlds. And in spite of that, now we will fight together, that is what we will do. He and I will be the best version of our being side by side.

I'm not an imbecile, Yue. Even in the midst of my brilliant happiness I know that Ash and I are far from a bright spring. In the middle of the garden that we are creating there are ice places, I know that we will have to overcome many blizzards yet. So you do not have to worry about me, even though I've always seemed like a child to you, I'm older than you. Trust me, Yue, trust that I put my heart in the hands of a wonderful person because he makes me feel loved too.

I think we both think that it is not necessary to put into words what our souls and bodies say so well but I think that I will soon tell all this to him, I will tell him that I love him with many beautiful words because after all he is a writer. Words are important to him and I must find mine to tell him how grateful I am to the universe for allowing me to meet him in the midst of this big and dark world.

The day I kissed him for the first time, I stayed with him all night. After showing him those two photographs of him that will be the jewel of my winter collection, the emotions that erupted when he kissed me were too intense. After kissing him and getting lost with him in the middle of the gallery, the only thing we both wanted to do was go to Ash's apartment, have a frugal dinner and lie down on his ample bed, he was in my arms, I was in his.

That intimacy was intoxicating. Ash's hands delineated my face and I surrendered to his touch with a sweet smile that nothing in the universe could have erased from my lips.

“You're beautiful,” he whispered suddenly.

“I'm just Eiji,” I said because if there is someone who is beautiful in this world, that's him.

“You're even more beautiful because of that, because you're Eiji and you do not know you're beautiful.”

“Hey, you're going to make me self-important if you keep talking about me like this.”

“I'm in love with you, leave me alone,” he said making me laugh. “Hey, boyfriend, do you think his majesty will want to kill me for stealing his best friend?”

“Yut-Lung?”

“The one and only,” said Ash and I laughed a little more because really Yue, he does not hate you but I think he has pretended otherwise too long.

“Maybe he´ll do a tantrum but nothing more,” I said with confidence (because I trust you, Yue, do not make me look bad)

“Are you going to call him to tell him?”

“Maybe I should write a long email about it. Is better.”

“Do you write love letters to Yue?” He said and believe me, the jealousy of his voice had a certain charm when he asked me this question.

“I would not call them love letters but…”

“I'm jealous,” he said and for a moment, a trace of childish jealousy crossed his green eyes which provoked me an access of such tenderness that I ended up kissing him once more.

“Why are you jealous?” I whispered on his lips.

“Because Yut-Lung Lee met you before me,” he said with a deep sigh. “That damn crazy snake does nothing but increase my debt to him, doesn´t he? I somehow owe him my life in two different ways.”

“Is that so?”  I asked trying to contain the laughter I got when he called you a mad snake (come on, do not get mad, you've called Ash worse things and you know it).

“Yes, first he saved me from Golzine's hell and now ... well, he made our worlds coincide, isn´t it? I hate to admit it, but the moment that Yut-Lung approached you, he approached you to me too and well, Eiji, you have brought a new life to me so…”

“So we'll buy Yue a gift when he comes to visit me,” I said and Ash frowned with resignation. “Ash, please.”

“I know, I know, you're going to force me to be related to Yut-Lung.”

 “Of course not, I do not want you to feel obligated to anything but you know? I owe a lot to Yue.”

“And that's why I'm even more jealous.”

“You should not, my heart is all yours now, " I said without hesitation. You are all that dwells in my heart, Ash.”

“Eiji,” he said, returning to his usual seriousness that is as charming as that playful side that he has let me know little by little. “I'm so happy to hear you say that, I'm selfish, I know. Look, I'm just kidding about Yue, I know I have to be civil and polite to him and I'll do it, do not doubt I'll do it. However, it is true when I say that I am somewhat jealous of him because nobody has ever written me a love letter.”

I smiled when I heard him say that and pulled him towards me with strength. Because he is as new as I am in this whole love affair. Because he has those kind of tender desires that maybe at our age, they might seem ridiculous. He longs for those romantic gestures of the movies, he wants to have a sweet first love. And I'm going to give all that to him. I'm going to start writing a love letter for him on paper and in life, do not doubt that I will, Yue.

Anyway, Yut-Lung, I think I should start writing Ash's love letter after Principal Lobo finishes talking to me. In fact I am writing this email to you from outside his office since Max wants to have a real serious conversation with me, at least that is what I was asked in the mail that his assistant sent me in the morning.

I think that my relationship with Ash is the matter because, although the regulations of the University do not expressly prohibit relations between professors, Shorter did not tire of telling me at dinner that we had yesterday that Max would like to make clear to me some things regarding Ash. Shorter says that our director has always been protective of Ash. Max is something like Ash´s self-proclaimed adoptive father and although I'm certainly nervous, I like the idea that there are more people in this world protecting and taking care of Ash.

My Aslan Jade Callenreese is wonderful, Yue, and the world has already done him too much damage so I will accompany him to heal from now on. My life has been transformed once again and I am grateful for it. The flowers of my soul will rise proud in the sun of Ash's smile and at this very moment this is all that matters to me. So feel happy too because spring will come back to me. Yue, I think I'll become spring myself whenever I think of Ash.

 

Love, Eiji.


	29. Subject: Should I call you Mrs. Callenreese now?

**From: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**To: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**Subject: Should I call you Mrs. Callenreese now?**

 

Dear Eiji:

You disgust me. I would like to be in front of you right now to make fun of the stupid face that you surely put every time you look at your stupid boyfriend whom I certainly hate and always hate with all the strength of my soul.

And really "crazy snake" is the most imaginative insult that came to his mind? I told you that Ash´s neurons were damaged forever by writing idiotic novels. It is ending little by little with Ash´s grey matter. Take care of him, Eiji, or you'll have to condemn yourself to the idea of spending your whole life next to an imbecile. Oh wait! That's what you've done already! Congratulations!

Leaving my hatred aside, that anyway, you know it's just a pose that I have to keep, I really feel happy for you. However, I will not give Aslan the pleasure of knowing that I am happy with this relationship simply because it is Aslan. I do not want the asshole to start thinking that he and I will be best friends forever and that we will sit down to weave bracelets of friendship as we argue about who of the two loves you the most. Besides, Eiji, if I start to treat him well the stupid Aslan will never know how valuable you are or how well you will take care of him.

Somehow I must let that cocky man know that having you by his side, he has found a treasure truly valuable because, dear, you have a capacity to love without limits that goes beyond you. And although all that love of yours will be wasted in loving Aslan Jade Callenreese, I will truly feel happy for you. As I told you before, I do not know Aslan at all but I do know that he must be one of those hopeless romantics has an eternal vocation to love one person for his whole life.

And that's fine, don´t you think? Aslan can never find anything better than you, Aslan is in fact the lucky one in this relationship because you, Eiji, you deliver everything you have without asking for anything in return.

The truth is that I do not want to start sounding like a mother but I'm still worried about you for that reason. It is true that you and I are different and that I always use the idea of "all or nothing", but Eiji, I do not want Aslan to make you unhappy. Yes, of course, now you both must be on top of your honeymoon of teenage love but Eiji, are you really prepared for everything you need to face? I'm not saying you will not be able to do this but, dear, there are some things that neither you nor Ash can control. Seriously Eiji, only you happen to fall in love with one of the most fucked up people in the universe.

But well, we cannot do anything to avoid it, you're practically engaged to Ash Lynx and soon I'll have to call you Mrs. Callenreese. How awful.

What I want to say with too many curses and little congruence, is that I want you to be able to remain happy in spite of everything because how the hell do you think that I'll stop loving you just when you're that happy? I told you, nothing you do will change my love for you. I love you for being what you are: my best friend, the best photographer in this fucking world, and of course, the imbecile who had to fall in love with my worst enemy.

Nothing will change between us, much less because I cannot stand the person you decided to love but as compensation I hope you really have to get me the best place to be with Sing in New York because obviously I will accompany you to the presentation of your new collection of photographs, I would not miss it for anything in the world. I'm curious to see the pictures of Aslan, I really cannot believe that he let you expose them which shows me by the way, that the stupid Aslan really feels something strong for you.

Now, dear, I'll ask you not to send me more sugary emails, will you? Have mercy on me! I almost had to inject insulin when I read your last email, Eiji. So take all that cheesy energy in your veins and write to the love of your life that you will adore him forever and all those stupid things that the lovers write without any shame. Be a hopeless romantic with him because you're right: Ash's heart will become strong if you do not stop making him feel loved. And he will need strength always, Eiji, believe me when I tell you that it was a miracle that everything he and Shorter went through has not made them crazy forever or worse.

Well, I have to leave now because I have to start packing for our trip, and I do not want to keep saying good things in Ash's favor either. In addition, Sing says that I should select my wardrobe with intelligence because he will restrict my luggage this time but I know he will not. Sing loves me too much to deny me anything. Also I cannot appear badly dressed in front of Aslan, I will not give him the pleasure of having more style than me. I have already been too generous with him in allowing him to go out with you without death threats in between, so let me compete with him otherwise, will you? Anyway, I know that he will always feel jealous of me and I love it. How I will have fun with him!

In short, honey, I feel happy for you. Take care of yourself, will you? At least during these two weeks in which I will not be with you, I want you to take care of yourself and know that I wish you the best in this new stage of your life. You deserve to be happy, you deserve to be loved and if there is no other choice but to accept that the asshole of Ash is the chosen one of your heart, then so will be Mrs. Callenreese.

I love you do not forget it.

 

Yut-Lung


	30. Subject: He is here again.

**From: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**To: iloveyutlung-soo-ling@gmail.com**

**Subject: He is here again.**

 

Sing:

I know I told you I would not panic about it but I cannot take it anymore.

I received another strange letter today, they are all Russian postcards where Natasha Karsavina, who was Blanca's wife, smiles carelessly and you know what this means, isn´t it?

Blanca is still alive and something tells me that he is free again but how? Wasn´t Yut-Lung's family supposed to be in charge of eliminating him completely? Look, I do not want to say anything to Ash about this. Blanca is still the biggest of his nightmares. I think Ash is not able to overcome everything that happened to him because of that last thing Golzine forced him to do and for which, I know Blanca will seek revenge.

What is worse is that if Sergei Varishikov comes to look for us, he will not come for Ash, he will come for what Ash loves most in the world and you surely know who that person is.

Eiji Okumura is in danger, Sing. We have to protect Eiji Okumura because if Blanca hurts him, it will also end up destroying Ash and we cannot allow it, understand? I am asking you for this favor because I do not want your husband to be involved once again. I know what he thinks of Ash and I know he will only blame him for all this but how could we avoid it?

I think Blanca has been watching us from the shadows. I think he had been patiently waiting for something like that to happen in Ash's life to launch into the attack. Because Ash has found someone to love, Ash loves and you know there is no worse horror than seeing someone else destroy the person you love. And if he manages to attack, Sing, then he will destroy us all because after all he was Golzine's best murderer.

He wants to destroy Ash anyway and if something happens to Eiji that's what he will achieve.

Please, Sing, move your contacts and gather as much information as you can about Blanca's whereabouts and how he managed to escape the fury of the Lee clan. I will continue to say nothing of this to Ash, I cannot do it. He is too happy, Eiji just moved last week to his apartment so you can already imagine the degree of happiness he must be feeling. Besides, his treatment starts going well at last, so as you can see, I cannot throw away all that without first knowing that we can defend him and Eiji. I know that Ash would be able to die for Eiji but I do not want anyone to die, we cannot allow such a thing again.

Ash saved me from Blanca once and I think the time has come to return the favor. Maybe if we can catch Blanca at his own game, then we'll finish all this before Ash realizes something is happening, don´t you think?

I swear this is the last favor I will ask, I know very well that all your life I have done nothing but get you in trouble but I am convinced that if we finish with Blanca, then we will close the doors of hell once and for all. Forgive me for still being the biggest problem of your life, Sing. I await your news very soon. At least I'm comforted by the fact that you're coming to New York next week. It will be good to see you. It will be good to know that I am not alone in this.

Love, Shorter.


	31. Subject: Why do you always have to work based on death threats?

**From: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**To: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**Subject: Why do you always have to work based on death threats?**

I hope you read this carefully, Shorter Wong, because I will not write it again and you have to understand it once and for all:

I cannot tolerate that you keep trying to leave me aside in the difficult matters that concern this family. And no, stupid, I do not mean you but Eiji. He is part of my family, so you know that it is my sacred duty to take care of him.

Who do you think you are to contact my husband expecting him to disrespect me by hiding information that is directly related to me?

If Eiji Okumura is in danger, then I have every right in the world to know, don´t you think? Besides, if we're in this situation now it must be my family's fault, damn it. I remind you that at the time we managed to defeat Golzine, the Lee clan was also fighting its own civil war, that war that ended up killing my mother.

It must have been because no one was really paying attention that the damned Blanca could escape. We all think that he would never appear again, what damned reason would he do it with? I think we were arrogant assholes, I think we thought that the head of the Corse Mafia died then nobody would dare to fight us again.

I was wrong, we were all wrong. We let down our guard but now that the Sergei has appeared again on the scene, maybe we can eliminate him once and for all. Look, I'll get to New York as soon as possible, you have to take care of Eiji and his stupid boyfriend. The two must be too lost in their honeymoon of love to notice something like that and that seems to me the best. Do not let them find out about any of this. We can handle it, believe me we have enough power to defeat a stupid hired thug.

Don´t let either of them know about this until we can control it, is that clear to you? Ask Cain Blood if his bodyguard agency has some type of covert service and get a couple of agents to watch for Ash and Eiji all the time.

This time it's me who is in charge of the Lee clan, Shorter, and I must be the one to destroy Blanca once and for all. I will destroy him before he even dares to look at Eiji. He believes that as a murderer there is no one better than him, isn´t it? He's wrong, Shorter, he's wrong because he does not know what kind of family he's getting into and if I have to be a murderer, I will be. We will not give Blanca the opportunity to make another movement. If he keep sending postcards, act in the most normal way you can.

Everything will be fine, understand? Even though you hate me, you must trust me because you know that if I say all these things it is because I will be able to protect everything that matters to me. And I care about Eiji, I care a lot, so maybe I'll have a long season in New York, I will not leave the damn big apple until everything is in order.

So don´t you dare to let me out again, has it been clear to you? Stop fearing, we will face this in the best way and nothing bad will happen. Call me as soon as you've hired the bodyguards, will you?

 

Yut-Lung

 


	32. Subject: A love letter.

**From: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**To: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**Subject: A love letter.**

 Aslan Jade Callenreese:

I use your full name because all the great love letters in history always start like this. The person who writes them, calls their beloved ones in a precious way and you should know that I cannot think of a better way to call you than your name. Your name sounds like music to me, so excuse me for not being able to be more creative.

A week ago you invited me to go with you to your favorite place in the world, that place that has always been your refuge. With a smile on your lips you said that you wanted to take me to the only place in New York where there were only happy memories for you, memories of all those afternoons in which you escaped the pain of life by losing yourself in the middle of the pages of a book .

I followed you, I followed you because I know that you love books with all your soul, that they are your home and also a sacred place for you. And besides, Ash, you should know that I would follow you wherever you want to go, so being with you in the quietness of the New York Public Library is something I would definitely do again.

Needless to say, I felt happy that you could share with me such a place, the place where you told me you have learned everything you know. Being surrounded by books, hundreds of stories that come to life when you start reading them was something magical and suddenly I felt able to write something for you. I longed for your green eyes to read my words with the same emotion with which you usually read your favorite authors. I longed to tell you a story that could make you smile.

You say that nobody can teach you how to write and I think that right now I'm beginning to understand it. You say that if you want to learn the art of literature, you have to immerse yourself in it and let yourself be guided by the works of those great men who, before you, filled the world with other new worlds created with imagination, ink and paper.

After that visit, Ash, I decided to follow your advice so taking advantage of the fact that I have the new photo exhibition ready, I used to escape for an hour every day to your special place. I wanted men wiser than me in the art of living to tell me if there was a good way to write a love letter, a letter just for you. And I believe that, without being disrespectful to all the men and women who before me loved so much to leave a testimony of that love turned into words, there is no correct way to write love letters: you simply have to let yourself go and write them, isn´t?

Writing is a complex art and I know I'm telling something obvious for you but I want you to know that if I turned to a research mission it's because I did not want to write you just nonsense. Because what I feel for you Ash, it isn´t nonsense, no. What you make live in my heart is the truest and purest emotion that I have ever felt in my life because you make me feel love.

I have to tell you that I had never really thought that I would ever fall in love with someone, love was not one of my priorities because I must admit that my heart was only able to accelerate at the moment it raised me up in the air in a pole vault. Sports was the only love I thought I needed, I was admired by all and I was a shining star in Japan.

I did not seek to know what love was, I believe that something inside me was convinced that something like this could not exist in the real world. That is to say, the whole world always bombards you with the message that you must love someone, that more than your right it is your obligation to find someone and stay by their side so as not to be alone. We flee from loneliness looking for love, we believe that love is the ultimate destination of our steps in this world but I do not think like that after meeting you.

I think since I started reading your books, I always identified myself with the loneliness of your characters, the melancholy of the landscapes you describe and in short, that tragedy at the end of each of your books that despite everything left in my soul a remnant of hope. When I read you, I realized that you also thought that loneliness was the last of our shelters rather than being a burden and I liked that. Because in your books that also speak of love, I could understand that love arrives without you expecting it and when it arrives, it does not solve everything, it cannot do everything but it paints the world in a thousand different colors. And that's fine, don´t you think?

By your side Ash, I know that love is not the ultimate destination of my steps but it will be a journey. A trip that I would not be willing to do with anyone's hand that is not yours. A trip that we do not know where it will take us but in which we both will walk hand in hand.

I feel lucky to see you smile at me every day. Sometimes I do not understand very well how it is possible that you have found something valuable in me. When I walk with you holding your hand I know that all the eyes that look at us rest on you and I do not blame them because you are beautiful.

I know you've heard that word many times throughout your life, Ash. I know that that word has hurt you more than any other, but it is inevitable for me to use it because that's the way you are. Human language is so limited that I would have to invent a whole language to let you know everything you mean to me.

However, Ash, days ago you asked me to teach you Japanese and I'm still feeling nervous with the idea that I'll be able to teach you something. In spite of that, I have decided that today I will be brave and I will share with you a term that has made me think of you. Because you're beautiful, but you're not just that.

You see, in Japan there is an ancient art called _Kintsukuroi_ which allowed artisans who worked with ceramics to repair precious pieces by joining the broken pieces with resin varnish and gold or platinum powders. The artisans thought that what had been broken should proudly show their wounds because they narrated their history, those imperfections made the object even more beautiful. The scars were thus the most beautiful aspect of the piece, the scars were not a source of shame but they raised their value.

I know there are times, Ash, when you feel yourself broken and like the artisan, you are trying to repair wounds in your soul that you will never have to hide from me. You are beautiful Ash because nothing has been able to destroy the strength that is hidden inside. And that beauty that arises from destruction like the flowers that grow stubbornly after a long winter, the beauty that does not appeal to the idea of perfection, is the most sublime beauty anyone can observe. We both work with art, Ash, and you know that art itself is not born from the perfection of human beings, it is often born from our most imperfect side, from that deep place that is full of pain, sadness, despair .

You are not perfect and I do not want you to be either. I fell in love with you in the same moment that I realized that you are a lonely man with thousands of wounds in the soul just like me. I fell in love with you at the very moment when I understood that I could make my love something similar to what the artisan does with gold and resin: it would help you to heal, it would help you to show you that all the pain that the world has caused you, it has not subtracted anything from the beauty that springs from you when you smile and your green eyes light up when you look at me.

As I told you, Ash, love cannot be against everything, but I know that if we are together we will make our lives works of art. We will tell the world a story in which two men decided to love each other and be the best version of each of them side by side. We will live many days together, maybe in some of them we will want to be far away again but you know? My soul will always be with you.

Your soul and my soul will always be united in some way. Because you are part of my story now. Because we will fill a book of life with our photographs and our words and all I want, Ash, is that the world that we will create will be our masterpiece.

I'm not going to promise you that everything will be fine because you already know that neither the world nor life understand the concept of justice. I will not tell you that everything will heal overnight because it takes time to rebuild but I will tell you that I will always be by your side and you will be the one to tell me how long that will last. So be it a whole life, several years or just a few days I want you to know that I will live that always with my whole being. Because to share my life with you is that dream that I did not seek but to which I will not renounce now that I have it.

If you're tired, Ash, I'll take care of you. If the darkness covers us, I will always have a light on with which I can protect you. If the pain comes and seeks to hurt you, I will sing again and caress your wounds without fear until they stop hurting. If in the past the whole world hurt you, I will seek to comfort you now. And if there is more pain, I will share it with you because although we carry our own solitude on our backs, in reality we will not be alone anymore.

I am with you, I will always be with you. As you do with the New York Public Library, please take refuge in me and keep in mind that nothing you say or do will change how I feel about you.

Aslan, my mighty dawn, I want you to know that it is a huge privilege to have met someone like you, a powerful force full of life who breaks through in the shadows. If I can ask you something, that would be if you let me walk by your side for a long, long time. The only desire of my heart is to be part of your life. I want to witness your joy and your sadness, I want to help you fly too.

You always tell me that you envy me because I know how to cross the sky but you also know how to do it now. You just have to kiss me one more time.

Fly with me now, will you? Because some people say that love is an act of faith, because you cannot fly if you do not believe that you can really do it. Let's then fly away from the pain. Let's go to the place that is farthest from a farewell and build a world just for both of us.

I would like to tell you a thousand more things but I think I will reserve some of them to be able to express them without so many words. I hope that the first love letter that someone has written for you has been to your liking and do not get too mad at me if it does not have as much quality as all those beautiful things that you are capable of writing.

I put my heart in this letter, Ash, and I did it because I am not afraid that you are the one who holds my heart and my whole life in your hands.

 

With love, all the love that I am capable of feeling, Eiji.


	33. Subject: Another love letter.

**From: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**To: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**Subject: Another love letter.**

 

Eiji, you are the cause of my most recent writer's block.

After reading your letter, I believe that none of my words, or even all of my novels together, could do you justice. So in return, I will write for you a love letter by your side with my own life.

I know it's not much. I know you could have someone less hurt by your side but you have decided to choose me, only me. I have chosen you today and tomorrow I am sure that I will choose you again. And when this world is over and I have to look for you in another universe, I will choose you one more time.

Your heart is already my shelter, I thought you knew. In the middle of your Eiji arms, I will become art. I will heal. Maybe I'll trip again. But all this, all that I am and what I will be,    I will live by your side. Thanks for meeting with me. Thank you, Eiji, for your existence.

Besides being the cause of my absence of words you are also the cause of all that happiness that all my life I thought, someone like me would never experience. Finally, I will say it in a way not as beautiful as you have told to me but I love you too.

 

 Ash.


	34. Subject: I do not want to go back to New York.

 

**From: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**To: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**Subject: I do not want to go back to New York.**

It has been only one day since Eiji and I are away from the cold New York City and I'm sure I never want to go back to college. Without a doubt, I'll have to call Max to tell him that my position as a professor can be given to the first imbecile to apply for the position. Of course, I'll also have to tell him that Eiji will not come back either and that we'll both stay under the warm sun of California beaches until further notice. Forever. Away from everyone.

Yes, Shorter, yes, I'm just talking about my dreams. I know that in the real world it will not be so simple to simply get lost on my honeymoon (as everyone calls it) with the beautiful and perfect photography teacher who is my boyfriend and I love him. And he loves me. What a time to be alive!  

I am sure that I have already told you about the letter he wrote to me, right? God Shorter, I think I've already memorized it. No one had ever written me such a beautiful thing and do you know what makes Eiji's words even more beautiful? I know that his letter is more than just words, he never says anything without a meaning.

These days by his side, have been like having a haven of peace in the middle of the real world. It's as if the world itself has been transformed, you know? Since Eiji moved with me, there are times when I'm doing the most common thing in the world and I find myself smiling like a fool remembering some of our talks or one of our kisses. Sometimes, I watch him smile and all I want to do is recite all the poetry that I have inside, all those beautiful words that I know I will not be able to tell anyone else.

Of course, I am not able to tell Eiji any of those things that I won´t write either. Although sometimes I catch him smiling while reading the short answer that I wrote to his love letter, I would like to be able to give Eiji more things. Because I know that my love, this love that I feel is extremely limited, my ghosts limit it. I know there are things that I cannot give to Eiji, not in the way that a normal person would.

I'll kill if you tell this to anyone, Shorter, but there are times when I feel that the kissing between Eiji and I will no longer be enough. And at that moment, at the very moment when Eiji's lips make me forget everything, it is at that moment when the fear of doing something that I will regret afterwards matters little to me. Because at that moment everything is about the heat Eiji makes emanate from my body, that heat that only seems to decrease when Eiji's hands touch me gently, with a care that seems to strike in the most sincere adoration.

It's as if his hands on my skin were that warm wind that brings seeds and flowers with it. The first time his hands searched for my skin underneath the cotton shirt I usually sleep with, I felt Eiji was touching past me, his hands were like a shy spring rain, that first rain that does not bring ice but rather it is like a pleasant torrent of warm water for the world. In Eiji's hands there was no pain, rather I was able to feel that Eiji's hands were on my skin to give me something, to give me all those little buds that later become proud flowers.

Eiji's hands did not want to take anything from me, they did not want to take anything away from me. His hands were creating again, everything was as he had said in his letter: he was a craftsman who was joining the broken pieces of an object a thousand times used. He filled my cracks with the resplendent gold of the love of his touch. Eiji was still trying to heal me and I did not let him continue.

I just could not, Shorter, I was not able.

I knew where those caresses would take us, I knew it and I think the least damaged part of my being wanted it with anxiety, I wanted it with a fire I had never felt before. I wanted to be touched by Eiji in that way. His caresses on my bare back and in my belly felt too good, his lips playing with the skin of my neck felt good too. My own hands were touching him and I must admit that the heat inside me multiplied a thousand times when my fingers touched the hard muscles of Eiji's body.

Everything was fine, everything was warm and longing. I was burning in my own desire, I could hear the pleased sounds that escaped from Eiji's lips when kissing me deeply or when my hands caressed his black hair with force. Something was going to happen between the two, I know, everything was going too well until it just was not and I remained inert in his arms, unable to stop him, unable to continue. I felt another object in their hands, I think a part of me was ready to run away from my body in the same way that over the years I learned to do it while the pigs fed on me. I was an object, just an object. Eiji could use me because that's what my body was created for.

I think I did not realize that something was wrong until my green eyes were fixed on the flushed face of Eiji who looked at me guiltily.

“Forgive me,” he said with dark eyes full of shame. “I did not want ... I mean, I wanted to but ... Ash ...”

"Eiji?" I asked scared.

It was there when I noticed that I had abstracted myself deeply. I do not know how long I walked away from him, I do not know when I stopped feeling his hands on my skin. I am sure, Shorter, that if I had let someone other than Eiji touch me like he did, that person would have done whatever he wanted to do. But not Eiji.

“Are you okay?” He asked caressing my cheeks. “Why are you crying?”

“I do not know,” I answered bringing my hands to my face and surprised to notice that indeed, my cheeks were wet.

“I hurt you again, didn´t I?”

“No, of course not!” I cried desperately. “You never hurt me.”

“So? Would you help me to understand it?”  He asked me kindly, there was so much love in his eyes Shorter that I felt guilty for making him go through all this.

“I do not know what's wrong,” I answered, avoiding his look because he was so sad.

“I think you know, try to explain me,” he said patiently, taking my chin between his fingers, making my eyes meet his again.

“It's a bad habit,” I said without knowing how to explain it better. “When the customers of Golzine's restaurant wanted to use my body, the only way to face all the things they did was to escape. When they started hurting me, the only thing that mattered to them was their pleasure so I could get lost in my thoughts. Usually, I started repeating the information I had learned in the Library or started writing my own stories.”

“Did I make you feel that way now, like an object?” he asked with a sad and embarrassed look.

“No, Eiji, no,” I said taking his fingers between mine. “Nobody had touched me like you ever, nobody. I was so lost in what I felt that I think I started to fear. I do not know how to respond to all this things that you make me feel so I thought that if I stayed still then you could do what you wanted and…”

"No, do not say that ever," he said with a look of panic. “It's not about me, okay? Ash, I do not want you to think for a single second that I need you to be an object to me. If you do not want to do it, then tell me to stop and I'll stop. If you're not comfortable with this, we will not do it anymore.”

“I like when you touch me,” I said with flushed cheeks. “Eiji, I like to be close to you.”

"Then we have to talk to Dr. Randy," he said confidently. "Do you think she'll let me go with you to one of your sessions?" I need to know what I can do, Ash. I need to learn to love you calmly, I need you to tell me when I'm overstepping the limit.

“I hate this,” I said hiding my face on his chest.

"There's nothing to hate, Ash," he said, wrapping me in his arms. “It's good, you know? We will learn together, I do not know anything about this either. In the end, sometimes we are just objects of instinct, is not it? But I do not want to be that, I just want to know how to make you happy, I want to help you heal.”

“You're already doing it, Eiji Okumura ,” I said calmly. “That's why I want to give you all of me.”

“Listen to me well, Aslan Jade Callenreese: I do not need you to give me anything, nothing at all. Being with you is all I want. If you want me to hug you, then I will. If you need a kiss, I'll give all my kisses to you. And if you do not need any of that, if you just want me to sit with you on the couch while you check your students' work with that smile of yours that sometimes fills with pride and then disbelief, then I will.”

“It is unfair...”

“It is not because it makes me happy to be with you.”

“Really?” I asked how a small child would have done it.

“Really,” he replied smiling warmly.

“I love you,” I said out loud, I know it's the first time he heard me say those words while looking into his eyes.

"I love you, Ash," he answered without hesitation, stroking my blond hair between his hands. “Now do you want to sleep? My sister used to sing me a beautiful song on stormy nights when I still felt scared even though I'm her older brother.”

“Do you miss being an older brother?” I asked and suddenly I realized that Eiji rarely talks about his family.

"Sometimes yes, Kaori is really cute," he told me in a whisper. “I'm sure she would love to meet you. My parents forbade her to talk to me but sometimes she still sends me letters and gifts. Now he studies at the University of Tokyo, she will be a journalist. Do you know what she gave me before coming to America?”

“What thing?” I said, because his face lights up when talking about his younger sister.

“A good luck charm,” he said in the middle of a tender smile.  It was an amulet for his old brother to finally get married.”

“I think it worked then,” I said and Eiji's cheeks blushed completely. “When we go to Japan, do you think she wants to meet me? Wouldn´t she mind that I'm, well, a boy?”

“Kaori will be happy for me, I think her good luck charm was a hint.”

“A hint?”

“Yes, she wanted to tell me: "You better return to Japan married to the American author of your dreams if you do not want me to take back the word again."

“I like Miss Kaori Okumura,” I said feeling calm again. “We should call her to tell her that her amulet worked and that I'll ask you to marry me someday. You're husband material after all: you know how to cook, you're extremely handsome and successful. Only a fool would let you go.”

“Thanks to heaven my Aslan has a very high IQ,” he said wrapping me with his warm laugh.

“Although Aslan is an imbecile in other fields of life.”  

“It does not matter, there will be time to become experts in that field too.”

“What if we can´t?”

“We´ll manage to do it, you´ll se. We will have a whole life to discover what we want, do not you think?”

I nodded at his words, I could not do more. When I'm in Eiji's arms, everything is easy to believe and right now, now that my green eyes look at his silhouette while he walks on the shore of a sea as blue as the sky, I think so too.

Shorter, I want to heal my soul but also my body. All my life my body has seemed a burden too heavy but maybe Eiji can teach me to look at it with his eyes, do not you think? And not only Eiji, also Jessica. Although we have left the treatment paused right now because of the Christmas holidays, I know that the idea of Eiji is good and I should talk about this with her. Maybe if I am not able to heal physically, my soul will never stop hurting.

And my life is too far from the pain now, I do not want to go back.

By the way, Yut-Lung Lee approached me after the opening ceremony of  Eiji´s exhibition and instead of threatening me with death for having dared to go out with his best friend, the man looked really tired and only asked me to take care of Eiji and not make him suffer.

Do you know what´s happening to his majesty? Did Sing finally discover that his husband is a cruel harpy and is he asking for a divorce? Maybe not, there's too much love in the air, I even saw Max Lobo flirting with my therapist. Can you believe it? So maybe everything is my imagination, although I must confess that lately I feel that someone is following me. My senses sharpened more than they should after my special training with Blanca, remember?

There is a constant presence, Shorter, sometimes I have the feeling that someone follows me wherever I go but, isn´t it really silly? Maybe happiness makes me nervous because I've never been so happy. Yes, maybe that's it, I'll think about it until I have to go back to New York because in the end, while your ass freezes with the cold of the big apple, I'll continue enjoying this summer next to Eiji.

We will arrive before New Year, by the way. Do you already know who will organize Ney Year´s eve dinner this time? Eiji insists that we should be the hosts this year so you are cordially invited. You and your Cain, Nadia and Charlie can come. I'll see you in two weeks.

 

Love, Ash.


	35. Subject: Stay in California.

**From: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**To: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**Subject: Stay in California.**

 

Ash dear, nobody misses you in New York.

In fact, it would be a good idea for you to stay there for ever and ever.

Have not you thought about changing your identity and living a nomadic life next to Eiji?

I personally think it's the best you could do. Just imagine this: you could start from scratch without anyone knowing you, without anyone trying to hurt you again.

But since I know that you are an idiot and that you will go back to New York anyway because you love to teach, although you always pretend otherwise, I must tell you that you do not have to worry about New Year's Eve dinner. We will all be present and although you omitted to mention Sing and Yue, they will also be with us. I know that your forgetfulness was only an unfortunate accident, do not worry.

As for the issue of letting yourself go, personally I think you should not hurry. I´ve  already told you once but just in case I will repeat it: do not analyze things so much, whatever it is that has to happen between you and Eiji, it will happen one way or another, although you would do well to make peace with your body.

Ash, before someone else can make you feel physically in love, it is you who must love every inch of your skin. That skin belongs to you, only you. And although it is difficult, although for me it is also a constant challenge to be able to open myself to that kind of experiences, believe me when I tell you that in the hands of the right person there is no fear.

So learn from Eiji, you both have to learn a lot together. What the demons made us feel like an attack, Ash, is actually one of the most pleasurable ways in which two people can let the other know that love exists. Think about that, think that you are giving yourself to someone you love and that someone will also protect you and clothe you with their wings in this type of flight. You are not an object, you have never been. In the hands of Eiji, you are a loved man and you are also capable of giving love.

Finally, that presence that you say you feel must be part of your paranoia nothing more, you should not pay much attention to it. Keep enjoying your honeymoon, that's what you should do. I, for example, will go to Cain's apartment tonight and I think that in some funny way I can defrost my ass.

Merry Christmas by the way! Give Eiji a hug from me, will you? It's just a hug, Ash, nobody wants to steal your boyfriend, you damned jealous shit.

Love, Shorter.


	36. Subject: Enough.

**From: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**To: shorter.wong@gmail.com; itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com; iloveyutlung-soo-ling@gmail.com**

**Subject: Enough.**

 

Dear everyone:

That´s enough.

It is enough to leave me out of a situation that is very disturbing. Enough of wanting to protect me with a silence that does not do anyone any good. I know something is happening and I know that something has everything to do with Ash.

I decided to write to you three so you can stop plotting behind my back because I know that´s what you have been doing.

Did you think I would not notice? All those strange looks you were sharing on the day of the presentation of my photographic exhibition? Do you think I have not noticed that a bodyguard much like Cain Blood has been following Ash and me everywhere? Do you think I would overlook Yue's bad mood which means he was more worried than he wants to show me?

Even the warning that Max Lobo gave me the day he spoke with me.  He warned me that maybe I should face more problems than a person should face in a relationship if I stayed with Ash. Max told me that there are ghosts that are more than ghosts. Max warned me that a certain situation with Ash's past was not completely settled yet and that I must be really strong if I wanted to stay by Ash's side despite all that.

I know you all know exactly what is going on and I demand that you let me know. I pretended that nothing was happening so as not to cause Ash pain or anguish but I cannot do it anymore, understand? I have reached my limit and I must confess that right now I am dying of fear because I have seen with my own eyes that things we did not expect have started to happen.

Three days ago I noticed that someone else besides the guard that surely Yue hired, follows us. Yesterday afternoon, while Ash and I watched the sunset from the porch of the house that we rented to spend our Christmas holidays, I could see a man who was trying to hide near the house next to ours. I know he realized that I was looking at him. I'm sure he wanted my eyes to notice his existence.

He is a huge man, tall and strong and when my eyes met his, he smiled scornfully before turning around while his long hair fluttered in the sea breeze. You know who that man is, right? I suspect very well who he is and if he has come to look for Ash, I want you to know that I am going to kill him.

That's why I need you to explain to me everything you know. I need to know who is the person that I will face because in his eyes, it is written he has a problem with me.

And if you think to tell me that I'm probably imagining everything, it's not like that. This morning I found in the door of the entrance the photograph of a woman who smiles in the middle of what seems to be the Red Square of Moscow. Behind the photograph was written the following message: "I will do the same thing you did to me."

What is it talking about? I know that message was addressed to Ash. I´m lucky that Ash has a habit of getting up after noon, but what the hell would have happened if he had seen that damn note first? I know that image would have destroyed him, I know that all this, everything that man plans to do will destroy him once more and even if I am the weakest fool in the world before your eyes, I will not allow it, understand? I will not allow it, I will do what I have to do with or without the support of you three.

So if you decide to keep pretending that nothing happens to let me be happy in my ignorance, then I'll have to pretend that I'll fight alone. But if you decide to help me, then it will be a pleasure to hear the story you have to tell me. Refrain from calling me, will you? I do not want Ash to realize anything, not yet. If he needs to know, I'll tell him when I know how we're going to face all this.

Yes, I know that in the scheme of great men like you, men who are accustomed to dealing with this type of situation, the stupid Eiji is nothing but a nuisance, a small child that everyone must protect even if he later becomes a burden. Well, I have news for you: if it's Ash, I'll do anything to defend him, understand? So if you decide to let me out of this one more time, I'll go fighting with that bastard myself. Whatever he is planning, I have to defend Ash before he notices something is happening.

I'm sure Ash did not notice anything. It is as if that man had decided to appear alone in front of my eyes, as if he was warning me that he has returned and that this time he will destroy Ash beyond what is possible. He also thinks that I am weak. He thinks that I do not represent any danger in his plans and maybe he is right but I need to understand well what the hell he wants.

If you really are my friends, if you really care about Ash and me, then help me take care of him by telling me the truth. Hiding things does not do anyone any good and I would love that for once in my life, you could give me the favor of looking at me as an equal and not just as Eiji the burden who is always putting his life in danger.

Yes, maybe I have not been the strongest person in the universe throughout my life but if I think Ash needs me, then maybe I can become a murderer too. Nobody will hurt Ash again. Do you understand me? No one will hurt Ash again.

I await your explanation to all this. Write me as soon as possible. Whoever.

Eiji

 


	37. Subject: Seriously calm down, you have to breathe.

**From: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**To: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**Subject: Seriously calm down, you have to breathe.**

 

Very good, Eiji, very good.

Although at this moment I want to call in order to tell you a thousand times how fucking inconsiderate you are, you’re right about something: it's not good to hide things that in fact, have everything to do with your stupid boyfriend.

Before I tell you what I know, before I reveal another piece of that past that was not good for anyone, I want you to stop thinking that I underestimate you because I do not do it, nobody does it. What actually happens is that we all think that a person like you, a person who has never had anything to do with the low worlds that we know because we could not avoid it, is suddenly immersed in the same shit that we could not finish as it was our desire.

Yes, Eiji, the past is chasing us again and it comes before us in the form of Sergei Varishikov, better known as Blanca. I know you must have heard this name before, I know Aslan must have told you about him.

Blanca was the favorite hunter and mercenary of Dino Golzine. You know that Golzine´s fortune was founded mainly on the trafficking of children, children like Ash and Shorter who were sold not one, but a thousand times to all the millionaire pigs who could afford to pay for entertainment of that kind. Blanca was the one who gave Ash to Dino, Ash was an exquisite rarity for being blond and having green eyes. Children like that are the most expensive. The children like that, are a strange jewel that the pigs that want them compete with each other with death bets.

Well, when Aslan turned seventeen, Dino knew that his star child had reached maturity. You should know that the pigs involved in this business do not accept getting involved with teenagers and Ash was already a teenager before everyone's eyes. When this happened, we learned that Dino planned to adopt him, planned that Ash's brilliant mind was always at the service of his business.

My family knew then that this was the time to intervene. If we wanted to save Shorter and Aslan, we had to do it at that very moment when security had been diminished around Aslan and Shorter, who was his right hand in the eyes of all.

It was not easy at all to rescue him, you know? I was there that night, the night my father pretended to offer me as a present to Golzine so we could have access to his mansion. That night, Dino had a new mission for Ash, that night he had planned for Ash to show him his absolute loyalty by committing the ultimate criminal act: murder.

At that time, although Blanca had ceased to be a hunter to become the private tutor of the heir of darkness, Dino had stopped trusting him. In the world of crime, Eiji, there comes a time when you know too many things and you have to be eliminated. That moment had undoubtedly come for Blanca, but instead of killing him, Dino Golzine and his twisted mind decided to do something a thousand times worse: leave him alive and broken, kill him in life.

There was only one way to do something like that, you know? Sergei thought no one knew, but he had a wife, his name was Natasha. To the amusement of all of us who contemplated Ash's initiation ritual in the Mafia world, Dino had planned to drive Blanca crazy by snatching what she loved most.

Imagine that, Eiji. Imagine such a betrayal.

Natasha was condemned to die from the first moment she had been related to a pig like Blanca, that's for sure. Dino took one of his most precious pistols and put it in Ash's hands. It was Ash who had to kill her. It was Ash who had to prove his loyalty that way. He could not refuse, not at the risk of being eliminated or worse, get Shorter killed. Ash was cornered and did what he had to do.

Ash became a murderer in that way and also, became the legitimate heir of Dino's infernal empire. Blanca went crazy, of course, but as if it were an action movie that was the exact moment when the Lee Clan entered the mansion and took Dino's men by surprise.

We kill them all, Eiji. Golzine himself died there, burned by the flames of the explosions that my father's men provoked. We think that the horror story was over there. I think that after saving Shorter and Aslan, nobody cared about anything else. I guess that's how Blanca managed to escape and you're right, he must be willing to destroy Ash but he will not do it directly, he will not kill him.

His threat is certain, Eiji, he will destroy Ash the same as Ash did to him.

Blanca will destroy what Ash loves most.

So you're wrong, honey. Blanca does not come for Aslan, Blanca will go for you.

That's all I can tell you now, I must apologize for not adding more details but I do not think it's necessary. Do not do stupid things, do you? I swear I will not leave you aside again but Eiji, I cannot allow you to be hurt, not even though right now you hate me because you think I do not trust you. So I warn you once and for all that I will not stop protecting you, neither you nor your boyfriend.

I doubt that Blanca dares to do something now, California is too public a place to come back to life. I think he will wait after the holidays, he does not know Eiji, but I watch him. And I will not let him touch you, understand?

So if you really want to protect your Ash, keep all this silent a little more, just a little more. You have to keep creating a paradise of sweet and pink love around him because if he knows you are in danger because of him he will never forgive himself.

Calm down a little, will you? Even if it sounds impossible, you have to be strong and stay calm. We will solve it all together, Eiji. You are not alone, imbecile. I told you the same day I met you that you would never be alone again and I will continue to fulfill this promise until the day I die, is that clear to you?

With love, even if you insist on hating me, Yut-Lung.


	38. Subject: Tell me everything is fine. Please.

**From: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**To: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**Subject: Tell me everything is fine. Please.**

Why do we feel so bad after Christmas holidays end?

It must be because the magic of the season suddenly vanishes in the midst of the painful return to reality, and I think this year it took me a little longer to realize that my period of grace with Eiji has come to an end.

It was not a lie when I told you I wanted to stay in California, Shorter. Those days will always be like the first page of the photo album where you keep only happy memories. I´ve been very happy for two weeks, that's the truth. Every moment is great if I share it with Eiji and the most usual things become small miracles in front of my eyes.

I know it's strange that he's talking about my past happiness but it's just that right now I'm starting to feel uneasy again. New Year's Eve dinner we shared yesterday was wonderful and even his Majesty Yut-Lung continued to bless me with the grace of remaining still and quiet while everyone else laughed, I feel something is not right.

What I feel is like that nameless turbulence that usually attacks me at any time and for no apparent reason. It is as if a storm is about to explode in the way that summer tempests reach the city. Apparently there are no black clouds on my horizon, but that's what will make the blow harder. I know something is happening but I do not understand what it is about. Everything seems so normal, so natural and at the same time there is too much tension surrounding me. And the worst disasters come like that, is not it? They do not warn you, you can never foresee them.

What will happen, Shorter?

I know you will tell me that I am being exaggerated but this time I swear to you that it is not just my paranoia, not even my eternal pessimism disguised as a taste for tragedy. I know something will happen and I know that something will hurt me completely. Even though Eiji is here with me, I feel that something is trying to separate us permanently, I believe that destiny continues to cling to the idea that I am condemned to be alone forever.

Yes, definitely happiness is not permanent but my happiness is Eiji now and if in my heart there is fear of losing this happiness, then I cannot help thinking that something bad will happen to him.

And I'm not ready for it. In the past I did not have to worry about anything or anyone that was not myself but I'm not alone anymore. If something happens to Eiji, I'll go crazy, Shorter, I finally said it. If someone tries to separate me from Eiji I think I will commit a murder again and God knows I have experience in that.

In fact, for days I cannot stop dreaming about Natasha's face. I see her in my dreams laughing at me, laughing in the middle of a pool of blood. She laughs at me, laughs at my happiness because I know that she knows that I am too lost in my illusion. Natasha laughs at me as if she were saying to me: _your happiness will be as lasting as mine, your happiness will be taken from you like the one that was taken from me._

And somehow, I know I deserve the punishment because I was the one who ended his life. When I confessed to Jessica this episode of my hell, she did not judge me, she never does. However, I noticed that his eyes, which are always so neutral in everyday life, seemed to hurt. I know that she found this hard to hear. She must have thought she had been talking with a murderer, a very regretful murderer. However, Jessica kindly told me that in that kind of situation, I was just a puppet and that, therefore, the responsibility of the whole affair falls on the hands that handled the threads but I'm not so sure.

I know the universe will cry out for revenge. I know that if there is a god, his vengeful nature is waiting for the right moment to let his anger descend on me. And what I fear most, Shorter, is that this anger falls on Eiji. You know how everything works: you do not lose yourself when someone tries to quench their thirst for revenge against you but you usually lose what gives meaning to everything you are. And that someone is Eiji. If someone wanted to kill me and drive me crazy, it would be enough for them to make a single scratch on Eiji.

How can I protect him, Shorter? What can I do so that my past does not touch him? At what point on the road did I start to be so arrogant as to think that I was not still in debt with life? As I approached Eiji, I forgot that my ghosts would chase him too and believe me, I totally hate myself for that, because I know that my closeness will harm him sooner or later and yet I find myself unable to take him away from me, I just cannot .

I have imagined thousands of scenarios in which I ask him to be again that couple of lonely beings that we were before we met and the very idea of not seeing him smile at me, the mere idea of not having his hand in my hand is unbearable. I cannot take him away and I know he cannot get away either.

Also, Shorter, there is something in Eiji's eyes that fills me with worry. His eyes full of light look opaque now. There are times when I find him looking obsessively through the window, it is as if he were also scanning the air in search of a signal that can warn us in advance about the type of storm that is coming. I began to notice all this from the last days of vacations and I was not able to mention anything because in the same way in which the eyes of Eiji are filled with shadows, they also shine again in a dazzling way when he looks at me until I think that the darkness in them was only an illusion of my mind.

I really would like to believe you when you tell me that's exactly what it is, that I'm just imagining everything but Eiji and I had a strange conversation a few hours ago. This conversation is what prevents me from sleeping because I have not done anything other than turn over his words over and over again while trying to understand the whole picture.

Eiji and I were trying to fix the mess we made in the dining room and in the kitchen of what is now our common home. He kept smiling and remembering the most pleasant moments of the night and I was happy that the rumor of his laughter continued to fill the apartment with life in the same way that everyone had done before during dinner.

 I think this was the first New Year in which I felt really grateful to be able to start another cycle. I felt grateful because the icy winter that now surrounds the city was not so cold if Eiji's laughter was heard around me.

So when we finished sorting everything, Eiji and I sat on the sofa that overlooks the penthouse balcony, the last fireworks of the night were bursting outside, so Eiji's eyes were full of colored lights. He looked at the sky with longing, as if he wanted to fly with me the way the fireworks did. Eiji was looking at the sky as if he was looking for a way to escape from everything and take me with him to another place away from all danger.

“Do you feel nostalgic?” I asked in a whisper and his black eyes settled on me calmly.

By then, his arms were holding me, we were both wrapped in a soft blanket that separated us from the cold environment outside. Again we were Ash and Eiji against the darkness and the cold, we were both together receiving the first of many New Years together in a warm way, we were very close to each other.

“No, I think I'm a little tired,” he said, placing his chin on my shoulder.

“You tired?”

“Well, sometimes I'm also human,” he said laughing with more joy than there was in his eyes. “I think the climate change affected me a little.”

"Really?" I asked and with each word Eiji said I was feeling more and more uneasy.

“Yes really. I would have wanted to stay with you all my life in front of the sea. I think that when the school year ends, I will take you with me to Japan, Professor Callenreese. What do you think? Do you want to start a new life in my place of birth? Izumo has really beautiful beaches.”

“Do you want to take me with you?” I asked really surprised. “I mean, I'd love to go to Japan with you but…”

“No buts, if you want to go with me then we will go together. I would like to introduce you to my sister and Mr. Ibe. I would like to build a life with you there. I know you have lived all your life in New York but I cannot stop thinking that there are too many bad memories and ghosts in this place. Maybe it's selfish to want to get away from everything you know. And yet, I dream of taking you to a better place with me.”

“I would not mind going to Japan and starting from scratch, not if I'm with you. Also, my Japanese classes are going very well.”

"Oh, sure!" He said, laughing honestly. “Every time I listen to you practicing I want to kiss you and goodbye practice.”

“I'm good for languages despite interrupted practices,” I declared in a confident way.

“You are perfect in many, many things my Aslan.”

 “Eiji?” I asked and I turned in his arms to look him in the eye, “What´s happening?”

 "Nothing, why do you ask?" He answered naturally, stroking my cheeks with his long thin fingers.

“I do not know, there is something that is not right, do not you feel it?”

“No, everything is perfect as it is right now.”

“Eiji, I'm serious,” I said, even though I wanted to believe that everything was fine with my whole soul.

"I'm also serious," he said and pulled me to him so that my forehead rested just above his. “You're here with me, our friends kept saying we have the look of being an old couple in love with each other's bones and that makes me immensely happy. There is nothing to fear, there is no other dream I want to come true at this moment because you are here, Aslan. You are here and I love you so much that I feel that the new year has been born so that I can love you more.”

“Stop writing me poetry in the air,” I said with my heart completely moved.

“You like poetry, you do not stop reading Emily Dickinson lately.”

“Did I recite _156_ to you?”

“No, Professor Callenreese.”

“It makes me think of you.”

“Does it?

“Yes,” I answered calmly and whispered the sonnet on his lips. " _You love me—you are sure—I shall not fear mistake—I shall not cheated wake—Some grinning morn—To find the Sunrise left—And Orchards—unbereft—And Dollie—gone!"_

“Are you afraid I'll leave you?” he whispered, pulling me strongly towards his body.

“All the time,” I said honestly. Sometimes I want to ask you to stay by my side forever every day.”

“You do not have to do it, I will not leave you.”

“What if someone else wants to take you away from me?”

“Who? It would be able to kill whoever even dares to think about it.”

“Eiji, I do not want anyone to hurt you.”

"Nobody will hurt me, I promise. I also promise that I will always be with you and if you do not believe me, I will buy an engagement ring tomorrow. I bet Principal Lobo will give me his consent to marry you before the laws of New York and the laws of the whole world.”

"Silly ..." I said, although the idea of calling him my husband someday, I found it charming in some way. “Max will tell you that you're crazy and threaten to fire you. He's demanding, you know? He thinks that nobody in the world could deserve me but he´s wrong, it's me who does not deserve you. I know I have made you change your whole life for me.”

 "I´ve done it for me too, Ash," he said confidently. “So stop fearing or I will seriously make you sign a marriage certificate so that you feel sure about my love for you.”

“You're going to have to make a romantic proposal for a real marriage, I'm also demanding.”

“I know,” he said with a smile. “And that's why I love you. You know what you want and what you want is me. I am a lucky man.”

“I love you, Eiji.”

“I love you, Ash. Now rest, will you?  I will not go anywhere, nobody will separate me from you and if they dare to do it, I know how to defend what I love. Everything will be fine. Happy New Year, Ash.”

His answers should have reassured me, Shorter. His kisses, all the sweet and warm kisses that we shared until we fell asleep in each other's arms should have calmed my anguish but they did not. Because he said he will defend what he loves, and if so, it is that something is threatening us in the end.

Shorter, what should I do? What the hell am I supposed to do now? In the past, I was able to fight against my enemies because I knew who they were, I knew their faces and their weaknesses but right now I do not know what to do. I knew that my happiness would not be eternal but I did not expect it to last so little. It seems that I am really condemned to misery. It seems that time has come to pay for a huge sin that, although it was not my idea, I committed anyway.

Tell me everything’s going to be fine, Shorter. Even if it's a lie, tell me I'm crazy and I should not worry. Tell me this because then I will be able to believe it. I will deceive my mind even if I cannot cheat my soul. I'll do that. That's the only thing I can think of doing anyway.

 

Love, Ash.


	39. Private number.


    **Private number (02:45 a.m.)**
    
    He says that you are his light.
    
    How could that be possible for who was destined to be the prince of darkness?
    
    Assassins have no right to happiness. He is a murderer.
    
    He is just like me.
    
    I have followed you from the shadows, I have always been close to him and that is why I know you are a bird.
    
    Do you know how to fly? That never mattered to the predators of the night, we can always find ways to tear our prey.
    
    Will you try to escape? Do you think you can face me?
    
    You make me curious. I do not know if you're brave for relating to someone like him or just too stupid.
    
    Find this place below the earth, little bird. Meet me here and I'll tell you things that will make you run away from him although maybe there's no need to talk.  
    
      
    
      
    
      
    
      
    
    
    
    
    **Eiji Okumura (02:57 a.m.)**  
    
      
    Blanca? Where is that place?  
    
      
    It doesn´t matter. I'll find you. I will not run away. I will not let you go near him.  
      
      
    
    
    
    **Private number (03:00 a.m.)**
    
    You are definitely just stupid.
    
    Come to me.
    
    Aslan has stopped caring for a long time but you ... you will help me destroy him.
    
    And you will do it,I´m sure. You will do it because if you do not, you will unleash hell around you.
    
    I know who will try to protect you. I know there is power behind you.
    
    But even a Dragon Lord cannot defeat me. He already tried it once and failed.
    
    He will fail again.
    
    Come to me, little bird. Let's get this over all at once.  
      
      
    
    
    
      **Eiji Okumura (03:05 a.m.)**
    
    I'm not afraid.
    
    (Message not delivered, number non-existent)
    
    I'll go for you.
    
    (Message not delivered, number non-existent)
    
    
    
      
        
    
        
    
        
    
    

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! I hope you have not found the new format of this chapter strange. This part of the story would be very difficult to tell through emails only, so I decided to use other types of communication such as text messages and calls. And I also hope that you do not feel like abandoning the story.


	40. Subject: Forgive me.

**From: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**To: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**Subject: Forgive me.**

I know that the whole world has abandoned you before. I know that everyone made you promises, promises that were never fulfilled.

You must know that right now I hate myself because I know I will be like the rest of the world. I promised you that I would not leave you and yet, I have to. I cannot let him hurt you. I just cannot.

I know I do not have the strength to face an opponent like him but what can I do? The mere idea of making you have to face the person who has done you the most harm in your life again seems despicable to me. I do not want you to have to see him again. I do not want him to have his eyes on you.

I hate him, Ash. I hate him for everything he did to you, for everything he allowed you to do. I hate him because you were even forced to do terrible things next to him. My hatred will give me strength, my hatred will keep fear at bay because I have to be brave for you and for me, for both of us.

You must also keep calm, you must be calm. I'm not alone in this, Ash, I swear I'm not alone. I will go to him, I will face him and I will defeat him in his own game of pride because I know that he believes that there is no possible universe in which he cannot get rid of someone like me. That is his weak point and I know that you should know it. Those who help me, will take advantage of that.

He is arrogant, he never thinks that a common man can become a hero if it is for love.

And I love you, I love you so much that for that very reason I have to protect you, do you understand? I am the one who has to protect you because in your life there have already been too many wars, too many wounds. So let me fight for you, for both of us. Please do not come looking for me. Even if you think I'm crazy and I'm a fucking stupid boy, stay with Shorter, stay with him until everything finishes.

Aslan, my Aslan, forgive me for leaving you now. Forgive me for not being able to receive this morning in your arms. Forgive me for not kissing you before preparing breakfast for you. Forgive me for not walking to the University holding your hand as we have done during these cold January mornings.

Forgive me for breaking my promise but in exchange I will make a new one: I will come back for you. I will come back to you and when I do, the ghosts that continue to haunt us will be gone forever. I will come back for you and I swear that when everything happens, everything will return to normal and we can move on. We can continue to heal. We can both continue to create our masterpiece in the arms of the other.

But you have to trust me, Aslan.

You have to trust me because love is not my only weapon. This is the first war I fight, but I will fight for both of us. I told you that for you I would be able to face all the demons of hell and that is precisely what I will do. Trust me, Ash. Even if after this you want to hit me, it's fine, my love it is fine. I'll let you tell me everything you want and then I'll hug you again and I'll never let you go. Thinking about it is like the light at the end of the tunnel, because there is always light even in the middle of the night. So this is not a farewell because "goodbye" is the word I will never tell you.

You just have to trust. You just have to keep loving me because if I know that you love me then I will overcome everything that has to be overcome. Ghosts, they're just ghosts, Ash and I'll finish with them.

This is the last snow and ice storm before our spring, Ash.

I swear, that after this storm there will be nothing but flowers inside and outside of you.

I love you, my Aslan. You know that I love you more than anyone else in the universe and that I will come back to you and repeat it a thousand times during all the days of that long life that we both still have to live. Because we will be together forever. Always, Ash.

I love you now and I will love you forever, Eiji.


	41. Incoming call.

**YUE: Y**

**ASH: A**

* * *

 

**[Incoming call. Eiji Okumura. 4:32 a.m.]**

**_Y:_ ** _Aslan?_

**_A:_ ** _I know you're surprised to hear my voice, Yue. I am too, I never thought I'd have to call you._

**_Y:_ ** _Listen, this is not a good time to..._

**_A:_ ** _I know, I know. You're on your way to the Freedom Tunnel, are not you?_

**_Y:_ ** _Do you know about it?_

**_A:_ ** _Eiji left his phone at home, you know how he is. I read the messages that Blanca sent him. Eiji wrote me an email before leaving too. His phone does not even have a password, so I'm calling from it._

**_Y:_ ** _Yes, he usually trusts everyone. Eiji is an open book, is a pure person and therefore has nothing to hide._

**_A:_ ** _He hid his plan for me all this time, however._

**_Y:_ ** _We had to plan something, I know you love being the center of the universe but this time we should have left you out. It was for your own good. I hope you know that Eiji did everything for your sake._

**_A:_ ** _Why? This is something that has everything to do with me. Blanca is here for me, he's coming to take revenge on me. Why the hell did you let Eiji get involved in all this? Why the hell you and everyone else decided about my life?_

**_Y:_ ** _Oh, Aslan! You're still a drama queen!_

**_A:_ ** _I'm not in the mood for your jokes, you crazy snake!_

**_Y:_ ** _Neither am I for your prince's rudeness! Look, if you're not going to do anything but get hysterical, I should hang up right now, understand? I set a trap, Aslan. I set a trap to finally catch the damn mercenary that I let escape once. I do not do this for you, I do it for Eiji and in the name of the bond that binds me to Eiji is that I'm helping him to end this madness once and for all._

**_A:_ ** _And for you too, you do it for you. Blanca murdered your mother, did not he? After your family took Shorter and me out of the Golzine mansion, Blanca fled to China and murdered your mother as the ultimate revenge against the Clan Lee, that clan that also had dealings with Dino._

**_Y:_ ** _If you already know all my reasons, why the hell do you not leave me alone? I want Eiji to be happy, understand? When I fled to Japan, he became my family and I cannot allow anyone to steal his happiness now. I do not even care that you're his damn happiness._

**_A:_ ** _Let me face Blanca, let me help you protect Eiji. Eiji is my life, Yut-Lung. Eiji is all that matters to me and I cannot lose him._

**_Y:_ ** _No, you're going to stay at Shorter and Nadia's house, understand? Although in fact, you cannot even leave your apartment, I have half of my guards stationed outside of your penthouse._

**_A:_ ** _You did what? Why do you think you're protecting me? I have to get out, damn it! Yut-Lung, I'm a killer for God´s sake!_

**_Y:_ ** _No, you are not, you never have been. To be a murderer you have to feel it, you have to want to take a life. And you do not feel that, you've never felt it._

**_A:_ ** _Blanca can be the first life that I enjoy taking for real. What if my fucking existence heals up once I finish with my biggest ghost once and for all? Maybe that's the only way to free my soul, do not you think?_

**_Y:_ ** _Wounds are not healed with more wounds, I thought you knew. You're still a whimsical and naive child despite your intelligence, Lynx. You're still the same old stupid asshole._

**_A:_ ** _I cannot leave Eiji alone, don´t you understand? Yut-Lung, I cannot! If that is being stupid, then yes, I am._

**_Y:_ ** _You will have to do it. You will have to trust him. You'll have to trust me again._

**_A:_ ** _I cannot._

**_Y:_ ** _Look Aslan, I know what Eiji means to you. Since he knows you, my best friend does not stop talking about you, about everything you make him feel. If he is your life, let me tell you that he thinks the same of you. He loves you, Aslan, he loves you and his love is brave, he is also brave. And even more than that, my trap is infallible this time. I'm not the same newbie boy I was when my family saved you and Shorter. My father taught me well. My father knew from the beginning that none of my brothers had enough intelligence or beauty to inherit his empire. All these years, my talent dealing with the problems of the underworld has only increased. I am the Dragon Lord of the Clan Lee to everyone, no one dares to contradict me now. I am strong, Aslan, I am powerful. So I will use that power, I will keep Eiji safe and maybe even our old debt will be paid if I can kill Blanca at once._

**_A:_ ** _Blanca is not an opponent like the others you've had. If he has survived all this time it is because he is a lethal killer, he is prepared for anything, he is practically invincible._

**_Y:_ ** _I am not anything, Aslan. I'm Yut-Lung Lee. Maybe I'm not a good writer like you but you know something? I have other talents that can now be more useful._

**_A:_ ** _Then you have to protect Eiji. You have to prevent Blanca from hurting him because of me, please, you have to do it._

**_Y:_ ** _Who would say that the day would come when the great Aslan Jade Callenreese would beg me like this?_

**_A:_ ** _If you want it to be like that, then I beg you. Save him. Make him come back to me. Please, Yue, make Eiji come back to me, I beg you to take care of him and bring him back home._

**_Y:_ ** _He will come back to you, you should not have any doubt about that. Listen, I got to Riverside Park. My men and I have the tunnel surrounded, Eiji and Blanca must already be here, which means that everything will end very quickly so for the second time in your life, leave the pride aside and keep calm. I will not lose the last battle of my war, Lynx. And for the record, you do not have to beg me for anything. If Eiji loves you, then you are part of my family already._

**_A:_ ** _You move me!_

**_Y:_ ** _You would be stupid if you did not realize the enormous sacrifice that this means for me._

**_A:_ ** _I'll pay you back the rest of my life, it does not matter._

**_Y:_ ** _I have already told you, killing Blanca will cover all the debt._

**_A:_ ** _Then I'll kill him for you._

**_Y:_ ** _What the hell are you talking about? Ash?_

**_A:_ ** _You take care of Eiji, I'll take care of the rest._

**_Y:_ ** _ASLAN!_

**_[Ended call 4:45 a.m.]_ **


	42. VIOLENT ATTACK AGAINST THE HEAD OF THE LEE FAMILY.

 

**THE NEW YORK TIMES**

**New York, January 23.**

**VIOLENT ATTACK AGAINST THE HEAD OF THE LEE FAMILY.**

**One man is reported seriously injured and one deceased.**

By Max Lobo

RIVERSIDE PARK, MANHATTAN. - Early this morning, elements of the New York State Police responded to a call for help that warned of a violent attack against the head of the Lee family. The authorities received an anonymous call warning that Mr. Yut-Lung had been kidnapped as part of a rematch orchestrated by business enemies.

The aggressor, Sergei Varishikov, identified as one of the most wanted mercenaries by the FBI in recent years, and who was reported as missing to this day, was found dead inside the Freedom Tunnel where Mr. Lee had been kept in captivity for what were supposed to be hours of intense anguish for their relatives.

Along with Mr. Lee were also his friends, the famous super sales writer Aslan Jade Callenreese and the professional photographer Eiji Okumura. It is reported that Mr. Okumura is being treated at the Mount Sinai Hospital after being hit by one of the bullets in the fray. Sources close to the Lee family report that the two aforementioned men had come to Mr. Lee's temporary residence in New York for a friendly meeting. It was during the dinner that the three of them were surprised and detained by the mercenary in question, whose original plan was to assassinate Mr. Lee and the possible witnesses to the crime.

When the police relief units arrived at the scene, Mr. Lee's private guards, who responded quickly to their work obligations, had reduced the attacker in a hail of bullets that ended up taking his life almost in the act. However, before his death, Mr. Varishikov, also known as "Blanca" fired point-blank at Mr. Okumura, who apparently tried to protect Mr. Callenreese from further harm.

Mr. Yut-Lung Lee´s husband, CEO Sing Soo-Ling, has declared in a telephone press conference, since at this moment he is making a trip through Europe, that the attack was orchestrated by one of the detractors of the Lee´s Commercial Consortium in China. Mr. Soo-Ling also said that he feels deeply embarrassed and hurt by the events that took place this morning and that he hopes everything will be resolved in a clear manner in order to avoid this kind of attacks that are aimed at damaging him and his family.

The investigations will continue according to the requirements of those involved. For the time being, Mr. Lee and Mr. Callenreese have given their statement of facts to the corresponding authorities and are now on the lookout for Mr. Okumura's state of health, who is currently serving as a teacher of a special course at New York University, and who has been a close friend of the Lee family for years.

It is expected that in the next hours those involved in the events will continue to be monitored constantly by elements of the special forces of the state police so that a new attack can be avoided in retaliation for the death of "Blanca".


	43. Subject: Come to me, let's have a second honeymoon.

**From: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**To: iloveyutlung-soo-ling@gmail.com**

**Subject: Come to me, let's have a second honeymoon.**

 

Sing, my beloved, forget about the damn business dealings with the United Kingdom and come to me, I need you with me. I need to hide myself in your arms. I need you to look at me and tell me that everything will be fine. I miss you so much that my body hurts. And I'm not even being dramatic, I think this time it was really too much for me.

I know I was the one who told you that everything would be fine but it is not. They hurt Eiji because of me and I keep thinking that you will have to kill me if something worse happens. We should not have put him in danger like we did, Sing. I should not have trusted my power to the level I did. Because even though everything was perfectly controlled, Blanca's plans seem to be protected by the most evil demon in the abyss.

At least I can say that all this disaster was worth it because I could finally avenge my mother's death but I do not feel happy, I'm not even proud of what I did and I swear I did not have to do anything but give the order to my snipers to kill Blanca without ceremonies.

When I got to the tunnel, Blanca was telling Eiji a lot of stupid things. He was so focused on looking like the martyr he has never been that I could attack him even before the idiot Aslan made his dramatic appearance in the tunnel.

Blanca was telling Eiji about everything Ash did under her orders and believe me, I could not help but be proud of our Eiji because the man listened to the mean murderer without flinching. Any of the damned words Blanca said diminished Eiji´s stoic pose. Our Eiji looked like an adventure hero. He was no longer the scared kid we both met in Japan.

The Eiji that faced Blanca was a man whose love gave him enough strength to be laughing at the criminal villain who was flaunting a stupid revenge that was possibly the only thing that had kept him afloat all these years. You know that the death of his wife Natasha was a mild punishment if we think about everything that this wretch did. He should have died in the fire that my father provoked, but I think it was his hatred that kept him alive. Hate and maybe that deal with the demons that allowed him to harm thousands of children without feeling a single bit of remorse for it.

Do you know something, my love? I keep thinking about how easy it was to kill him, it is something that will continue to cause me unnecessary conflict for years but I cannot help it. Let's think about it, Blanca made this situation a cheap soap opera show and all for what? Just to let himself be killed after a cowardly attempt to attack Eiji? Something tells me that Blanca wanted to be freed from his pathetic existence and that he is such a coward that he could not have done it himself. So are all the murderers, at least those I know: they do not hesitate when it comes to taking a life but if it is theirs, there is nothing they fear more than death. Maybe they fear the hell that awaits them or maybe, they contain a complete hell in their chest.

Anyway, Sing, I hate Blanca because I think he used me to kill him. I think he thought it was right within his twisted mind. He knew that if he messed with Eiji I would not act otherwise, that I would have no choice but killing him. I really believe that Ash and his happiness were never the motive of his reappearance. Blanca wanted me to release him. Perhaps the little conscience that remained intact made him act like this due to the memory of my mother's murder, that murder that never had a clear motive to be.

And I cannot think otherwise.

When Aslan appeared in the tunnel, Blanca did not even look at him. His eyes were still fixed on Eiji. His eyes were looking for me through him, I know it was like that. And it is that when Aslan appeared on the scene, I knew that I had to act, the time of the meaningless chatter had come to an end.

Everything would have gone according to plan if the always heroic and completely imbecile Ash had not gotten into this, I swear. I told the stupid guy he should stay at home but what did he do? He appeared in front of me and caused Blanca to shoot Eiji! Everything happened so fast, Sing, that I could not explain it to you in great detail. In a second, Blanca was speaking of the thousands of ways in which Dino Golzine had abused Ash and then, the stupid Ash was there, in front of Blanca.

I think Eiji thought that Blanca would hurt Ash again because he stood in front of him to protect him and in that moment, at the same moment that I ordered the shots against the damned murderer my snipers (who by the way, are more lethal that the good Sergei), the rain of bullets began. And one of those bullets is now in the belly of my best friend and it's all my fault, yes, it's my fault. I can admit this to you because I love you, but before others I will always blame Aslan.

It was my fault because I forgot that Eiji is noble enough (and imbecile) to want to die instead of his beloved and that's what he did: he took Ash in his arms and received that stray bullet that was perhaps the last desperate attempt for Blanca to maintain the facade of a revenge that should never have happened.

That's the stupidest thing about all this, Sing. This makes no sense.

I'm sure that bullet was not even aimed at a specific goal, it just happened to be a terrible tragedy and now Eiji is really badly hurt and I do not know what I'll do if he does not wake up, he's been unconscious for two days.

I wouldn´t be able to look at Mr. Ibe or Kaori Okumura face to face  when I have to explain  to them what has happened. I do not know what the hell it will be of me if I lose the only good and kind person who has crossed my path. Sing, you know that Eiji is my only true friend, you know that before him I did not have anyone else. And now he's lying in a hospital bed because of me, and seeing Aslan's pale, haggard face does not help either. The man looks like a wandering spirit. I know that Ash is also destroyed in some way and even then the only thing that matters for him is Eiji. He loves Eiji so much that I know that if my friend's life is over, Ash's will also end.

I myself am tired to the core. I have not slept at all, I cannot sleep and I cannot afford to be weak because I am the Dragon Lord of the Lee clan and nobody should realize that I really just want to cry on my pillow at least two nights in a row.

I´m so weak, my love. I feel that I am going to collapse at any moment because I have managed to avenge the death of my mother but that seems so little when I think that I will also lose my best friend because of it and due to my lack of prudence.

That's why I need you to be here with me, I need you, Sing. Your Yue needs you by his side, you know that you are the only person in front of whom I can be a fucking weakling without feeling bad. My heart is bleeding right now, Sing. I swear that when I looked at Eiji collapsing on the floor in a red pool of blood, it was like seeing me again crying over my mother's bloody corpse.

It's as if the world insisted on taking my family away from me, do not you think? The world already snatched a mother from me, and now threatens to take away my brother, the only real brother I have ever had. The thought is so terrible that writing it has even been a challenge.

I need you here with me, please leave your brother Lao in charge of everything and come to me. I need your strength, I need your intelligence and your love. Sing, your love has always made me a better person so come and surround me with it, okay?

I'm sure Eiji also needs all the people he loves to be with him now. Aslan does not leave him for a single second and although I know that Aslan is Eiji's great love, I think our love would also do him good. Eiji needs us to be strong next to him and I´m not going to resist more if you do not come to me.

Sing, do not let Aslan Jade Callenreese see me cry, I swear I'm about to cry at this moment and it is pride that keeps me standing but it will not be enough for much more time. Come with me, let's help Eiji get well and then, let's disappear from the world and have a second honeymoon away from all these problems.

Although I must be grateful that Blanca has found the fate he deserved, until Eiji opens her eyes I will not feel well. In your marriage vows you said you would always take care of me and that you would kiss me until I forgot my pain and all my guilt. Now is a good time to fulfill your promise, Sing. Please do not delay, beloved of my heart. Please come and protect in the same way you have always protected me all my life.

I love you. I miss you. I need you by my side urgently.

 

Yours, Yue.

P.S. Thank you for handling everything so perfectly with the press, by the way. Those vultures would have torn me apart by gossip if the real version of the story had come to light. Fortunately, from this side of the world I will always be able to count on Max Lobo's pen to defend myself against public derision. We must send him a large gift to divert attention from this attack with the article he wrote in a concise and convincing way, do not you think? That man deserves my eternal gratitude, more now that he has rediscovered himself with the love of his whole life. I think Max will marry Dr. Jessica Randy later this year. Eiji told me and well, I think we can use that as a pretext to give him a good wedding trip. He deserves it for continuing to protect us all through the stories he tells the world.


	44. Conversations heard through the walls of a hospital room.

**Conversations heard through the walls of a hospital room.**

 

**Nurse: N**

**Ash: A**

**_N:_ ** _Mr. Callenreese, you have to leave, the visiting time is over. The doctor must check up Mr. Okumura right now and he will not be able to do it if you keep clinging to his hand._

**_A:_ ** _No, Mr. Lee bought me all the time I want. So as long as I want to be with Eiji, there's no visiting time limit for me, miss. The doctor can do his job without problems if I stay here._

**_N:_ ** _I am sorry! The head nurse had not warned me about anything._

**_A:_ ** _Go off, leave me alone, please._

**_N:_ ** _If you will excuse me, Mr. Callenreese._

* * *

 

**ASH**

_» Are you going to open your eyes today Eiji? Yut-Lung and Sing have been here for a while. I had never seen his majesty so sad. He really loves you. I think you and his husband are the only people that a person like Yut-Lung Lee could love. I do not blame him, you know? Anyone who looks at you for more than five seconds knows that a person like you should not be let go. You are like spring, have I ever told you? Nobody complains about spring, is not it? When it arrives, we embrace it as if we had never felt it on our skin. Although winter also has some magic, we crave flowers, we yearn to feel the warm April sun on our face. You are like that for me. You were since I saw you smiling in the middle of the courtyard of the Faculty of Fine Arts. Maybe you were my spring from the moment you came into the world. I believe in destiny, Eiji. I believe that you and I still have too much life to share. If your eyes do not open again, Eiji, I'll be left alone in the dark, I'll be winter again. Eiji, I've never asked anyone for anything, but please open your eyes. Look at me again, Eiji, look at me again because the flowers that you have sprung on me are withering. Eiji, my Eiji, please._

* * *

 

 

**Yue: Y**

**Ash: A**

**_Y:_ ** _What did the doctor say, Aslan?_

**_A:_ ** _That everything is in order, nobody explains why Eiji does not open his eyes. Blanca's bullet caused Eiji to lose a lot of blood but his unconsciousness is not normal. I do not know what to do anymore, Yut-Lung._

**_Y:_ ** _Do you talk to him? Maybe if he heard your voice he could wake up again._

**_A:_ ** _I talk to him at all hours, I do not even know what the hell I'm telling him after a while._

**_Y:_ ** _Keep doing it, do not stop calling him. You know what he told me in one of the emails he used to send me when I was in Japan?_

**_A:_ ** _The love letters?_

**_Y:_ ** _Those he writes for you, you're really a jealous shit._

**_A:_ ** _Maybe I still envy you because you met him before me. I think that's that, you know? I know you've never thought of me in any other way than being the worst stupid person in the universe, but I envy you because you had Eiji by your side longer than I._

**_Y:_ ** _So what? The only time that Eiji cares since he came to New York is the time he has lived with you. The idiot of my best friend told me that he would be able to go anywhere you go, that's what he told me in all the cheesy emails he talked about you. He will go wherever you are, so keep calling him by your side, will you?_

**_A:_ ** _Do you hate me?_

**_Y:_ ** _Do I hate you? I thought we had made it clear that I’ve hated you since I met you._

**_A:_ ** _I speak of real hatred, not of that noble sentiment that you display for everyone_

**_Y:_ ** _I could not hate you and I hate myself for that. Somehow, Aslan, you and I are the same. I always envied you, you know? Yes, I envied you. There were so many people around you, so many people who loved you for all those stupid things you write. I, on the other hand, have always been a pariah, I always was before I became the Lord Dragon of the Lee clan. Sing was the only person who loved me forever, maybe since we were kids. I thought that Sing was my only friend and my only family but later, Eiji appeared and changed everything._

**_A:_ ** _Yes, he has this bad habit of creating worlds wherever he goes._

**_Y:_ ** _That's why you have to bring him back, Aslan. Only you can bring him back. I know I should not ask you this after it was my fault that Eiji is in this state._

**_A:_ ** _Your fault? Maybe if I had not run like a fool to a place where nobody called me._

**_Y:_ ** _Yes, your IQ tends to descend alarmingly when it comes to Eiji, we all noticed it. But it was not that, Aslan. Blanca wanted to settle her debt with me. I hope you do not feel left out, but this matter was between that demon and me. You were the bait, nothing more._

**_A:_ ** _He used us all._

**_Y:_ ** _We were stupid. I admit that despicable men like him always make their plans go exactly as they want them to come out. But that does not matter anymore, none of that makes sense or ever will. Now we must think about Eiji._

**_A:_ ** _If he does not wake up anymore…_

**_Y:_ ** _Not even say it, he will wake up. He's so foolish that I know he will not miss the rest of his life next to the stupid love of his life._

**_A:_ ** _Does that mean that I have the blessing of the Lord Dragon from the Lee Clan to ask Eiji to marry me when he wakes up?_

**_Y:_ ** _I'd kill you if you do not ask him for marriage.  I would look for a good man for him if you let him go. Believe me, I know a thousand men better than you around the world who would make a great husband to Eiji._

**_A:_ ** _I believe you, I do not deserve someone like Eiji._

**_Y:_ ** _The bad news is that Eiji believes that you are the most beautiful and perfect man in the world._

**_A:_ ** _I'm lucky then._

**_Y:_ ** _You are, piece of stupid shit. I must go now, Aslan, if we continue having this tender conversation people will think that we are best friends and the truth is that I am already used to despise you so, if you will excuse me._

**_A:_ ** _Thanks, Yut-Lung Lee._

**_Y:_ ** _Why do you thank me?_

**_A:_ ** _because you brought me all the happiness that was missing in my life. I´ve never told you so._

**_Y:_ ** _Your debt to me is priceless, huh?_

**_A:_ ** _It is..._

**_Y:_ ** _Well, if I ever need you to kill someone from a nervous breakdown with all that crapy crap you write, I'll let you know. Although you know something? Make Eiji happy for the rest of his life and you and I will not have more debts to pay._

**_A:_ ** _Count on me, Mr. Lee._

**_Y:_ ** _I'm counting on you, bring him back, Aslan._

* * *

 

**ASH**

_»Eiji, my love, it's time to wake up. It's been two weeks since everything happened and I do not know if I'll be able to endure another day looking at you like that. Everything is fine in your body, Eiji, everything works as it should but you do not want to wake up, why not? We would all like to see you smile again, you know? Even your students do not stop sending flowers and messages of encouragement. Max has been sympathetic to both of us, there are substitute teachers coordinating the work of our children. Eiji, you have to see the final result of our project, do not you think? That project that united me to you will have a beautiful result that the world cannot miss._

_«Eiji, we have to go to Japan when the school year ends too, remember? I've talked to your sister on the phone and I can tell by her voice and the warm way she talked to me, that Kaori wants to meet me. She does not know what happened to you was my fault, Yut-Lung told her that it was all because of him so you do not have to worry. Kaori told me that she cannot come right now and I promised her we'll both go see her as soon as summer starts. Also, Eiji, when we are in Japan I will ask you a very important question. I know you want to hear that question. I know I could let someone else ask you that question, someone to stop polluting you with his own darkness. But I'm still working on it, Eiji, I'm still trying to become a better man, that man who deserves to be with you. I'm still trying to be starlight for you. No, you should not worry. I have not stopped attending my sessions with Jessica, everything is fine._

_»I think talking to her is what has kept me strong for you because I know that now you need my strength, all that strength that I thought I did not have. Since I've known you, you've done nothing but save me from myself and my loneliness over and over again. Now it's my turn, do not think I want you to wake up just because I'm tired, because it's not like that. I need to see your eyes, Eiji. I need to look at you again and know that you came into my life to not leave, at least not until we've both walked a long path._

_»I still have many stories to tell you. We still have to take many pictures together. Eiji, I cannot lose you now. Even though it sounds selfish, I cannot let you go. Wake up, Eiji, look at me again. Your eyes have always looked at me in a different way, I am different in your eyes. You always look at the world with love even though the world has hurt you too. You did not let your pain turn you into a despicable being like me, like so many others._

_»The world needs your light, it needs that joy with which you are able to live every day, no matter if there is rain or there is sun. Eiji, you promised that you would be with me always remember? Make this forever a reality. Please, do not go to that place where I cannot reach you. Your Aslan needs his Eiji forever. I promise you that I will be better. I promise you that I will stop being afraid of all those things that you make me feel and desire. I promise that I will make you happy, that I will keep every day on your lips that adorable smile that I fell in love with. Right now, I'm just afraid to lose you, I'm just afraid that you'll get lost in a darkness where I cannot find you. I'm afraid you're going to a sky where I cannot fly with you. Eiji, our destiny is to be together. Do not leave me. I do not want to be alone, Eiji, I want to be with you always. Always Eiji. Forever._ _»_

* * *

 

**N: Nurse**

**E: Eiji**

**A: Ash**

**_E:_ ** _Ash?_

**_N:_ ** _Mr. Okumura!_

**_E:_ ** _Where's Ash?_

**_N:_ ** _Mr. Callenreese went out a moment, he's taking a business call._

**_A:_ ** _EIJI!_

**_N:_ ** _Mr. Callenreese, you cannot take him in your arms with such force!_

**_A:_ ** _Eiji! Oh, Eiji! You woke up, you woke up my love, Eiji._

**_E:_ ** _Why are you crying?_

**_E:_ ** _Mr. Okumura, stop talking, the doctor is about to come, we need to check you before you ... I know it was hard to bear it, but you cannot kiss him now, Mr. Callenreese!_

**_A:_ ** _Eiji, my Eiji._

**_E:_ ** _Ash, I made you cry._

**_A:_ ** _It´s happiness, Eiji, I'm crying because I'm happy._

**_E:_ ** _Ash, what happened?_

**_A:_ ** _Nothing. Everything is fine, everything will be fine Eiji._

**_E:_ ** _Don't cry, Ash. I love you._

**_E:_ ** _I love you, I love you Eiji._

**_A:_ ** _Always._

**_E:_ ** _Always._


	45. Subject: S.O.S (again)

**From: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**To: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**Subject: S.O.S (again)**

Dear Yue:

It is a pity that you had to return to Japan before I could go back home. No, I am not reproaching you, but I would have liked to see you at the welcome party that Shorter and Nadia organized for me, it was a nice meeting.

I know you will tell me that I am an idiot for not having noticed it before but I did not know that there are so many people besides Ash for whom I mean something important.

Everyone was happy to see me awake, everyone joked about the fact that I intended to leave Ash living as a widowed before our marriage and feeling surrounded by such love and affection, I could not help but being surprised. Although I laughed at the latter, the truth is that afterwards I could not help feeling guilty.

I know I should not have run like an imbecile to Blanca's trap. I know you warned me that you had everything under control but the mere thought of that asshole hurting Ash again, clouded my good judgment completely. I wanted to kill him, Yue. Never in my life had I felt that kind of hatred in my veins, you know? That hatred that burns like tar and runs through your body like lava. That hatred that makes you understand that at the bottom of all human beings there is a desire for unhealthy destruction that is what makes us capable of everything. I wanted to kill Blanca with my bare hands, that's what I wanted to do all the time he was talking to me.

And yet, being in front of him I felt that I was in front of a hypnotic snake that numbed my will. I knew that he did not want to kill me because if he wanted to, he would have saved the graphic description of the horrors he committed against Ash and would have just killed me, do not you think?

But when Ash appeared in the tunnel, when Ash's green eyes filled again with fear at the sight of his former jailer, I simply let myself go. I tried to protect Ash, I forgot everything you told me but my Ash was again facing that person who destroyed his life and I had to protect him.

I know it's a poor excuse, Yue, but that's why I acted the way I did. I know that was also the reason why I put my life at risk and I want to apologize. Forgive me Yue, forgive me for pretending to be the hero of the story, something I am not.

The hero of this story, in fact, is you. I already told you but I'll put it in writing so you never forget it: you ended up with the darkness that was chasing Ash. I know he does not notice it, but since Blanca died, something seems to have been reborn in Ash. It is as if the part of Ash that Blanca had tried to condemn, had been released at the exact moment in which that man died. Thank you for that, Yue, thank you for saving me and for ending one of the greatest ghosts that still tormented the person I love with all my heart.

You have saved my life twice now. The first time, you taught me to be strong, you taught me how to get up and move on. You showed me that when a dream ends, you may be able to find new dreams within yourself. And now you saved me again by finally releasing my Ash from a pain that seemed to want to hunt him forever. I know you're still feeling bad about the fact that you think Blanca used you to set him free but it was not like that: you freed the world from a huge evil, that's what you did.

And is that my Ash seems to be a new man now you know? Since I woke up and he took me in his arms again, he has not stopped smiling. He has returned to work a week ago, and although he is usually tired when he gets home, his smile seems to be sewn to his lips. He speaks to me with emotion, he talks about our project with love.

Aslan Jade Callenreese is happy now and I think he is no longer afraid to be happy. I think happiness had always scared him, you know? Ash feared that the ghosts would come to snatch from him all those motives of joy that throughout his life were so difficult for him to find. But now he no longer fears the end of happiness, I think Ash has wisely decided to enjoy the journey without thinking that one day all this happiness will turn into sadness.

And it is necessary to bear in mind that although the happiness of the two is enormous, winter always comes back to cover the world for a very good reason: the winter gives us a lesson of humility and of hope because under the cold it hides the new flowers.

My Aslan is like a cherry tree in bloom now. So beautiful and radiant, so triumphant. In fact, I would love to have him with me in Japan when everything is covered with flowers to be able to tell him: _just like these trees it is you; regardless of the harshness of winter you are reborn a thousand times and each time you do it, your beauty only increases and increases. You are able to beat winter. You are strong and brave each time you cover your wounds with flowers._

Yes, I'm corny. I thought you already forgive me for that.

Anyway, Yue, I just wrote to tell you that everything is still in order. Maybe I can go back to my work duties next week because although Max says there is no hurry, the truth is that I miss my students and I'm dying to see with my own eyes all those beautiful advances that the kids made in my absence.

By the way Yue, I need your advice on a crucial issue for my life. You see, I know that because of your education you have an enviable good taste in fine jewelry and according to the latest surveys, your best friend really needs to buy an engagement ring urgently.

After what happened to us, I think it does not make sense to ask myself if I'm sure or not of the decision I made, you know? No human being has his life assured and that is why I do not want to waste my time. I'll ask Ash to stay with me for the rest of our lives. I will ask him to let me live a long adventure by his side.

I know that after asking such a question it is important to seal the promise with a jewel so, considering that I will make my proposal right after the closing ceremony of the school year in June, do you think you could come to New York before that date for you to help me choose a lovely ring? Do not worry about the cost, the recent photo exhibition I did left me with a lot of profits.

And even though I´m asking a bit much of your friendship, would you want to be my best man? Well, you and Sing, actually. I cannot imagine anyone else that can guide me to the altar where Ash will be waiting for me. If he agrees to marry me, of course ... Oh Yue! And if he does not accept? Do you think he won´t accept?

Now I'm really scared!

 

Love, Eiji.


	46. Subject: We accept to be your best men.

**From: iloveyutlung-soo-ling@gmail.com**

**To: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**Subject: We accept to be your best men.**

 

Dear Eiji:

My precious Yue has been crying in my arms since he read your mail and he asked me to answer your request with a happily yes. I think he's excited, it's just that. No, do not worry, nothing bad happens. I think my Yue had waited for this moment his whole life, you know? That's why he's crying, he just feels too happy for you.

We both worried a bit about seeing you alone, I know that for you loneliness was never a burden but even so, we are pleased to know that you have found a person with whom to share your path. I want you to know that I also feel very happy for you and that I support with love the decision you have made. Ash and you have belonged to each other perhaps from the very beginning of the universe so do not be afraid. If your heart feels happy and sure of the path you have decided to take, do not ask anything and just keep going with the person who loves you and whom you love with your whole being.

Yue and I will be there to celebrate with you. And of course, Eiji, we'll be happy to be your best men, and we'll travel to New York next weekend to help you choose the best ring in the world for your Aslan. Yue says he will not let you make a style mistake in something as important as an engagement ring and judging by your damned taste for Nori-Nori sweatshirts, my husband says we should save you from yourself. Textual words of the owner of my heart. You know that I myself suffered the unspeakable to find a ring worthy of someone as beautiful and demanding as my Yue.

Anyway, Eiji, we will see you in a few days then and congratulations again for your decision.

 

Love, Sing

 

P.S. Yue also says that you´re being an idiot. Aslan cannot reject you because if so, we'll have to kill him. So do not worry. Everything will be fine. We love you!


	47. Subject: Encounters.

**From: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**To: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**Subject: Encounters.**

 

SHOOOOOORTER!

I found it, I finally found it.

After days and days of wandering through the finest jewelers in New York, today I have finally found the perfect engagement ring for Eiji. You have to see it so I attached the photo, don't you think it's beautiful? It is perfect!

In fact, nothing you say will change my mind, everything in the ring that I have chosen seems to me simply out of the best of my dreams. The jewels (diamond, emerald, ruby and sapphire) are resistant and colorful, they symbolize in a wonderful way the love I feel for Eiji, don't you think? In addition, it has the shape of a flower, the form that the jewels create is simply a poem. My ring is a flower that defies winter and with which a new spring always begins.

Hell Shorter, I'm so excited that I would like to wake Eiji right now just to put the ring on his finger but I still don't have it with me (believe me, if I had it I wouldn't wait another damn second). They will deliver it to me in mid-June so I don't have to wait too long, what are two months when you have an eternity waiting for you?

Anyway, I wanted to write you this email from the moment I arrived home but let's say I got distracted. Eiji was already here when I arrived, he was reviewing several of the photographs that Max asked him to take as a farewell gesture for our seniors.

They are beautiful photographs, full of hope and also of sadness but it is with those two emotions with which people usually start a new journey, is not it? We long for the past that will soon cease to be ours today and we embark on the path towards the unknown, towards what nobody can foresee.

Once again I could not help but feel completely surprised that Eiji's photographs could capture all those emotions: the smiles full of joy for the beginning of a dream; the sadness of life's great changes and finally, the proof that our students were part of something even bigger than themselves.

I couldn't help feeling moved, you know? I myself was one day a literature student with nothing to name mine more than my talent. I also started a trip like the one they will start shortly. I would have liked to tell them all that I am proud of them, that it fills me with joy to know that I was part of so many dreams but you know how I am. I don't like saying so many words, I always keep them to write them. Although maybe this time I can say everything I think since Max has asked Eiji and me to give the farewell speech at the diploma delivery ceremony.

It is interesting to note that this time I did not even complain about the appointment as a keynote speaker, I think even Max was somewhat surprised that I took everything so calmly. A year ago, without going any further, I rejected the offer before Max could even put it into words. However, this time everything is different.

I want to talk. I want to be heard. I want to do things that I have never done because I am not the same person I was a year ago. I have changed, Shorter, I know that an irreversible change has taken place in me and I am happy with that change. I know that everything has to do with my treatment and with the recent events in our lives. I think that when Blanca died, much of my darkness died with him. It's amazing how the curse of a ghost can hurt you so much but this time we won the battle against hell, don't you think?

I don't want to talk about him anymore. Jessica says that sometimes it is better to store past things that aren´t useful in a box to which we should not return. It is like burying the remains of painful memories once you have exorcised them because you do not need to continue carrying them, you do not need them. That is what I want to do with everything bad that happened to us. I will forget, Shorter. Now that I have managed to understand that none of that was my fault, now that none of those memories hurt me, I want to forget everything.

Jessica also says that if I can't forgive some things, it's fine, that I have time to keep working. Healing, Shorter, is an art that is achieved with patience, don't you think? And I think that right now I have the right to be patient with myself because there is someone in my life who is worth continuing to heal.

My Eiji, my future husband (I know I have not made the proposal yet but I am too excited to be able to call Eiji like that, leave me alone) will be my life partner and I know that he will help me recover every single piece of my heart that is still broken. Next to him my own scars no longer embarrass me because he always turns them into a work of art, his hands always cover my body of flowers wherever they pass.

That was what he did a few hours ago. That was what we both did and Shorter, never in my life had I felt all that heat he made me feel.

You may think that it is too much information and presumption but you are always bothering me with the fact that you are my intimate diary and one cannot save the graphic details to your intimate diary, isn't it? Also, you love reading the rough details so what you will read next will be done at your own risk.

The reason I got distracted when I got home was Eiji, of course.

I don't know what happens to me when I look at him lost in the contemplation of one of his photographs. I think I can't help feeling the owner of the entire universe when his thin and slightly smaller figure than mine appears in front of my eyes.

His hair has started to grow once again, you know? At that moment, several unruly strands of dark hair that had escaped from the band in which he had tied them covered his forehead that was puckered with small folds of concentration.

As it happened from the first day I saw him, Eiji seemed to me the most beautiful man on the entire planet. He was wearing a white cotton shirt that was open on his belly. Looking at him like that, so close to me and at the same time, completely far away, I couldn't help but shudder. I wanted to run to him and touch him. I wanted to be able to take the place of the fabric of his shirt with my own body.

Are you surprised of my words?

I was also surprised, I will not deny it. But Eiji's skin attracted me to him in a violent way, impossible to ignore. My desire to walk my hands and my lips through his skin was too much.

You know that in that sense, our relationship was still in limbo and Eiji never complained about it. That is, there had been other times when we both had touched each other over the clothes until exhaustion, until our kisses became anxious and full of passion but what happened today has never happened before.

Shorter, I think Eiji and I, well ... don't laugh, will you? I think that Eiji and I had never been closer to each other, not the way we were today. I know it is perverted to say so, Shorter, but just remembering those hours we spent exploring each other, makes my blood burn again in anticipation.

I think I understand a little more now why desire clouds men's minds, I think that when you dedicate yourself to trying to memorize the skin of the person you love the world around you, it doesn't matter. Everything stops, you know? It was like that for me. I got lost with Eiji in a gentle mist in which his body was all that mattered to me.

And, when I finally stopped looking at him as the stupid I am and approached him, I felt I was doing the right thing. My whole body seemed to belong to Eiji's hands which landed on top of mine when I hugged him by the waist. It was as if I was at home, Shorter, I had never felt this way, to feel that my home was more than just that huge pent-house in which I lived alone most of my life. But I'm not alone anymore, Shorter, I think I'll never be alone anymore.

"Hello ..." Eiji told me when he felt my lips kissing the soft skin of his neck.

"Hello ..." I said, putting my lips on his ear.

"You arrived early today ..." he said in the middle of a sigh when my hands began to caress his bare belly.

“I wanted to see you. I missed you ...” I kept whispering.

"We haven't seen each other for three hours ..." he said laughing.

"An eternity, Eiji, an eternity ..."

"True, but you're here now. I missed you too.”

“Really?”

"Really, Ash ..." he said and a pleased sound escaped his lips as my hands began to descend to the south of his body.

"My Eiji.”

"What's up?" He asked.

"Can I do this?" I asked, perceiving that my own voice was shaking as my fingers kept exploring that skin I had never touched.

"If you want, yes ..." he said confidently, opening his eyes just to stare at me. “You can do what you want because I want you too.”

"Eiji ..." I said and my body shuddered again.

"Don't tremble, don't be afraid," he said, taking my hands over his skin. “Everything I am Ash, everything is yours so do what you want. I love you. I love you and it's okay to express love like this.”

I couldn't say more words, Shorter, he had already said them all.

You know that the same thing always happens with him, it's as if all those beautiful words that I try to say and write with him just fade away. And instead of words it is kisses, caresses, sighs and a thousand promises that sprout in my mouth. It was like that for me. I gave myself to Eiji's kisses as if it were drinking water from a spring in the middle of the desert. I let my lips let him know how much I love him and felt that my legs turned to jelly when his fingers began to undress me in a slow and smooth way that only increased the heat of the flames of my skin.

Eiji's tongue drew figures inside my mouth. I could barely breathe, I could barely stand in the arms of my beloved who approached me as if I wanted our naked bodies to be closer even though it was physically impossible to be. I didn't realize when it was that I stripped him of his clothes. I just knew that I wanted to touch him without barriers and that I wanted to feel him near me.

I don't know how I could do it, but when I realized Eiji was sitting on my lap in the living room armchair and seeing his face flushed and his lips swollen from my kisses was simply beautiful. He moved rhythmically over that part of my body that seemed to have a life of its own. Eiji's hands caressed me sweetly while I felt that I was going crazy.

He was teaching me that a caress like that, something that I had always considered dirty and perverse, was actually an act of passionate love. Eiji's fingers going up and down the length of my erection were ... well, they were glorious. I felt that in the center of my body something would explode and when I heard the sounds that escaped from Eiji's half-open lips when I began to touch him the way he touched me, I wanted to catch the echo of that sound in my own lips. So I kissed him, I kissed him deeply while still caressing him until I felt him explode, that an energy that had remained trapped inside my body exploded at last.

Eiji accompanied me in the explosion minutes later. He uttered my name in the midst of an ecstatic groan that had the supreme power to make my body boil with heat and desire once more. He was so beautiful like that, naked and blushed on top of my body, his dark hair glued to his forehead by sweat and his lips, his blessed red lips full of me, full of my own fire.

"Did it feel good?" He asked me as he bit his lower lip and I swear I had to contain a growl that went up my throat when I saw him do something like that.

"Better than good ..." I said stroking his lips, bringing him closer to me, circling his waist with my hands. "And you? Am I not so bad at this?”

"I´ve already told you," he replied, circling my neck with his arms, moving back over me, making me want to touch him the whole night when I felt the delicious friction of his body against my skin. “There is nothing that my Aslan Jade Callenreese is not able to do.”

And then he kissed me again while my fingers caressed his wet dark hair. We both filled the apartment with more love sounds that made me thank the fact that I had bought a noise-proof house. From the sofa, we fell to the floor in a wonderful knot of bodies meeting for the first time and certainly not for the last time in a thousand different ways.

I enjoyed so much what I did, Shorter, that even now I am surprised that I have not felt fear. I'm not afraid anymore, that's the truth. When Eiji touches me I am no longer afraid of losing my sanity because I know that I am not an object in his arms, I will never be. In Eiji's arms, I am the other half of an encounter but it is more than just an encounter of skins and bodies: in the midst of my desire, Shorter, I also find myself face to face with that love that every man deserves to know. And I know him now and I can swear that I can meet Eiji again and again and again.

So that's why I'm happy. I will not be responsible for any type of trauma that this information causes you. Besides, I know that you and Cain should do worse things, right? By the way, will Mr. Blood ever give you an engagement ring? It's a shame that even I got married before you, Shorter. Don't make Nadia suffer anymore and settle down, will you?

Anyway, I hope to see you soon so that you can accompany me to buy the suit that I will wear at the closing ceremony at NYU. I want the suit to come as a surprise to Eiji and I could help you choose a suit worthy of you too.

What the hell do you need a suit for? Well, I won't let you go to my wedding dressed like a gangster from Chinatown. You will be my best man, Shorter. You have to dress up to the occasion, don't you think?

 

Love, Ash.


	48. Subject: Let´s hunt elegant suits!

**From: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**To: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**Subject: Let´s hunt elegant suits!**

 

Aslan Jade Callenreese:

Have I ever already told you that I hate you because you always take it for granted that I will say yes to whatever thing you ask me to do for you?

First I agreed to be your best friend when we were children.

Later, I became your right hand in hell so that we could both survive.

Almost a year ago you named me as your intimate diary and I must say that I am really happy with everything you have accomplished with yourself during these months.

And now, you come and name me your best man and I must say that when I read that line I started to tear a little but what do you want me to tell you? It will be an honor to see you join your life to Eiji, who by the way, sounds like the description of a perfect erotic dream (no, don't complain because I called it that, you were too descriptive) despite its daily angelic purity.

The ring you chose is beautiful and I know how colorful and resistant the life you build next to the man you love will be. So, my friend, let's go hunting some fancy tuxedos tomorrow. Maybe if I get really handsome, Cain realizes that we will be the next ones to commit ourselves for life, don't you think? Oh, I feel excited!

I will see you tomorrow then. Help me choose something good, because I really want to be the best partner in crime for you. I have accompanied you in the midst of the deepest darkness, but I will also be your companion in that day of light that is yet to come.

 

Love, Shorter.


	49. Subject: The big day is tomorrow SAVE ME!

**From: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**To: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**Subject: The big day is tomorrow SAVE ME!**

 

Yue, I think I'm in the middle of a panic crisis.

All the ideas I had prepared for tomorrow's great day seem to have become a whirlpool in my mind. I don't know what I will do, Yue. I'm shaking like a little boy holding a small blue velvet box between his fingers. That's how scared I am. I swear I'm dying of fear.

Are you sure the ring we chose for Ash is the right one?

Are you sure that tomorrow is the best day to make the proposal?

Do you think this golden ring to which we have set a green and a black jewel to symbolize the color of Ash's eyes and my own eyes is appropriate?

The jewel just arrived a week ago and as it happened from the moment you talked about this with your family's jewelry designer, I felt it is a perfect ring when I had it between my fingers. It’s elegant, bright, extremely perfect before my eyes, but what if Ash doesn't think so? What if we had to analyze more models before choosing this one?

Yue, I will attach a photo of the ring because right now I fear that my memory is failing. I need you to tell me if this is the design that you, Sing and I chose, the one that we all believed perfectly matches Ash. Is this really the ring I will put on Ash's finger tomorrow when I ask him to stay with me forever? Look at it well, will you?

Can we still change it if it is not correct? Tell me yes because I think I'm about to cry! Yue, what if Ash tells me it's crazy to get married? That is, what if I am rushing simply because I fear losing him? I really fear losing him, Yue. But you can't base a marriage just on that, can you? A marriage must be based on love, trust, not fear.

However, I swear there is also love, a love that goes beyond me and if I wasn't sure that I love Ash with my whole soul, I wouldn't do this but ... Yue? What if Ash gets scared to read the legend that I inscribed on the ring? Do you think _"always"_ is an exaggeration?

I have never been afraid of something like that, of always promising love for my Aslan but we are talking about him, do you understand? No, of course you don't understand, I don't understand myself either. It is that, now I am alone in the house and for that reason the fear seems to be clouding my good judgment and the decision I had taken with total conviction. Ash is still in college yet, he told me that he had to discuss a very important issue with director Lobo, I guess something related to the closing ceremony due tomorrow.

That is why I have also thought about whether it is really a good idea to make my proposal in the middle of the campus gardens. It was there that I met him. It was there that he waited for me that day when he guided me to the boardroom of the Faculty of Fine Arts.

What if something like that is not beautiful enough for him? I mean, shouldn't I plan something a little more spectacular? My idea is nothing romantic right? Oh, Yue! I can never overcome the marriage proposal that Sing planned for you! All those fireworks that wrote your name in the sky so that later Sing descended from a helicopter bound to your arms in the middle of that Greek cruise ship that we both took only half a year after I met you both.

Faced with such a show, my modest marriage proposal seems like a bad joke, my Ash deserves something a thousand times better than that. Yue ... What if Ash deserves better than me? What if that scares me? Is that ... how can I know if I'm really the man he deserves? What if my love is not the legendary love that life owes to Ash?

Yue. Yue. Yue. Yue.

My heart is going to burst, I swear. I feel like I'm going to pass out and throw up when tomorrow, after the winners of the best multidisciplinary work team of this year are announced, I take Ash with me to the school grounds where I've learned so much and in which, I have been invited to stay another year. My heart will not really resist it. Ash will also be wearing a dark blue suit that only makes him look a thousand times more beautiful than usual and I swear my fainting is more than possible because you should know that looking at Ash steals my breath even when he wears pajamas so, can you imagine my predicament?

Maybe I should rethink things, don't you think? Perhaps, if I call Sing he has more fabulous ideas about how to make the best marriage proposal of the century. Maybe we can check more engagement ring models. Maybe if I think things better, even my sister Kaori can be here the moment I ask Ash to marry.

Truth be told when I called Kaori yesterday, she seemed more than excited and happy to hear me say that I was about to ask Ash to be my husband. She said she was happy to see that her good luck charm had worked. I believe at this precise moment my sister must be in a temple ringing bells of thanks to the gods for her benevolence towards me.

But the gods are wrong too, don't you think? Yue, I don't want to be wrong about this! I want to continue filling Ash's green gaze with joy that is the only goal of my life. I want to be close to Ash always. I want to have a wedding ceremony at the New York Public Library because the more I think about it, the more I convince myself that we should fill Ash's favorite place with more happy memories. I want to join my life with his in the midst of love stories, love letters, the love that people feel and will always feel for books.

I swear I really want to marry Ash and swear eternal love without fear, swear my love forever to him. But when I look at the ring I have chosen, my idiotic questions go around in my head again and seriously, I am five minutes away from rolling on the ground trying to calm down.

What the hell is wrong with me? Is this normal? What if I really end up fainting, throwing up and making a fool of my life tomorrow instead of building another happy moment next to Ash? (Yes, all that can happen at the same time because I am a disaster).

Yue. 😱😨😰😱😨😰

Help me. 😱😨😰😱😨😰

Please. 😱😨😰😱😨😰

With deep shame, your friend Eiji, the coward shit.  


	50. Subject: Breathe, drama king.

**To: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**From: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**Subject: Breathe, drama king.**

 

OKAY. OKAY. BREATHE

Is it really not clear to you that the only drama queen of this relationship is me?

I had to hang up the phone because I could barely understand your whining so I think once you take a deep breath and give yourself a good slap (that which for reasons of time and space I cannot give you with all my love and affection) everything will be fine.

Ready?

Well, now you can read this calmly.

Look, Eiji, I really can't believe that after everything you've been through to be next to Aslan, you are now questioning whether or not you are the best man in the universe for that idiot. And let me tell you something CLEARLY YOU ARE!

And it is not a contest, believe me that nobody cares if you are or not enough because what do you think, idiot piece? Aslan Jade Callenreese will wake up the next hundred years of his life thinking that you are the best thing that happened to him in life and do you want me to tell you something else? He is also right!

Eiji, my dear Eiji, of course you are ready. You are a beautiful man, you are brave, loyal, strong and above all, full of an ability to love and surrender without limits. Aslan cannot say no to all that, no one can refuse the opportunity to live a love without end, a real love, that love that you and he had always wanted do you understand?

So breathe and instead of thinking stupid things, imagine that beautiful life that you will have next to the person you love. Eiji, I can really tell you that you're not wrong about this because it's always spring in your eyes since you looked at Aslan for the first time. And if a person is able to fill your dark eyes with a universe of flowers, there is nothing to fear.

Look, you have the right to feel nervous, that's normal, you're human after all. But you can't run away, you can't escape from yourself or what you want because you would be giving up your happiness. And breaking news, fool: you're not a coward. You are part of my family and in this family nobody lets fear overcome them. We do things despite fear and that, my dear, that´s true courage.

So your idea to propose marriage to Aslan is perfect because nobody else knows that man better than you, just as my Sing knows me. He knows the kind of person I am (that's why sometimes I also wonder how it is possible for him to love me without conditions) and that is why he made that dramatic marriage proposal that remains legendary among China's highest society.

 But your Aslan is different, don't you think? He doesn't care about the show, the only thing Aslan wants and I tell you because he told me himself, is that it's you who joins his life to his. He doesn't need the circus. He doesn't want colored lights in the sky. He loves you, he loves you in a simple and wonderful way and I swear that when you ask him for marriage, the lights he will see will all be in your eyes.

So breathe, take that precious ring between your fingers (because it is beautiful, we designed it exclusively for Aslan) and put your heart in it. And tomorrow, when you and Aslan are surrounded by summer flowers and sun, ask your question with or without fear and I hope you send me immediately the photograph in which Aslan will be wearing his engagement ring after telling you that he will be married with you in this life and in all the lives where he can find you.

 

And if he says no, I'll have to kill him. Period.

Love, Yue.

 


	51. Subject: Before our spring.

**From: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**To: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**Subject: Before our spring.**

 

Dear Shorter:

 

My Eiji is sleeping right now. The moonlight enters through the window and perches on his bare skin almost tenderly. It doesn't surprise me at all you must believe me. He is so soft and warm that I know that even the moon caresses him carefully, even the moonlight would want to protect him.

Right now I look at Eiji sleeping and I can't believe that he and I will be together our whole life. I mean, something in my heart knew it before me, but just now, now that my eyes remain fixed on the beautiful golden ring that Eiji put on my finger a few hours ago, everything is more real, you know?

Because he and I will be each other's husband next year. Because Eiji and I will be an official newly married couple in the eyes of the entire world next spring. No, we have not yet decided on the wedding date but I do know that we will get married next spring, there is no better season for us, don't you think?

I would like to join my life with Eiji's in a magical place, a place that is full of flowers and the perfume of a day that will only mark the beginning of an eternity for both of us. Because we both have that. We have both decided that we will walk through this world hand in hand and that regardless of the passage of time or the way in which the world tries to change us, we will both continue to grow together, we will both be the life partner of the other and I cannot imagine a destiny happier than that.

Eiji Okumura has asked me to become her beloved husband for life and when I think those words, the sweet resonance of all of them makes me smile and blush like a schoolboy, wow, I couldn't even bear the urge to write to you in detail how beautiful was the marriage proposal that Eiji prepared for me. I know that Max Lobo and half of the photography and literature students at the University of New York made the whole thing public but all those videos are far from the true bliss I experienced at that moment.

You know it was my plan to also propose to Eiji since I commissioned his engagement ring to the best jewelry store in New York. You know that my plan was to propose to spend his life with me next week, since we would both spend half of our vacations in Japan before returning to the planning of next year's courses. I had even spoken to Kaori, Eiji's sister, and she was helping me find a romantic place to carry out my proposal.

However, as it has been with Eiji since I have known him, he never ceases to surprise me and now I cannot help laughing like a jerk because it seems funny that we are both planning to ask for marriage at the same time. We're fools, Shorter, we're really a couple of kids playing love and you know something? That makes me love him even more because every day by his side is a discovery.

Today, for example, I discovered that Eiji will make my life a garden full of surprises, that although we both love each other we will never stop discovering new things about each other. Today, after Max Lobo named Eiji and me as the leaders of the best multidisciplinary project team, I really felt that I would never feel as happy again as at that moment when my students and Eiji's students cheered our Name. Well, I was wrong, happiness has no limits when I´m with Eiji.

Today for example, since I woke up hugging Eiji's warm hips it seemed like a complete miracle. We both woke up with a smile on our lips for the simple fact of having the opportunity to wake up next to each other. Eiji kissed me on the lips in that deep and slow way in which he always does and I clung to his body with joy. Needless to tell you what happened before breakfast. Needless to say, I surrendered to him with passion, with abandon because it is him, and I love to feel his hands and lips drawing spring landscapes all over my skin.

You might think that after that, anyone would be shit of anyone to ask for more happiness in a single day but that's the point, Shorter: neither Eiji nor I ask for more joy to the universe, bliss keeps on coming to us simply. So after my magical awakening, Eiji and I had breakfast, we showered together and dressed in the elegant clothes we had prepared for this day.

I must tell you that Eiji looks completely handsome wearing a black suit, I swear my legs were shaking when he asked me to help him tie his dark tie. Believe me, even though I had touched Eiji until I was fed up just a few minutes ago, my hands were burning to know what was hidden under that suit that made Professor Okumura look like a prince of fairy tales. In addition, Eiji had tied his hair in a ponytail that contrasted perfectly with the elegant air of his suit giving him his daily air of eternal youth.

What do you want me to tell you, Shorter? My Eiji seemed to me the most beautiful man in the universe when I saw him dressed like this and I noticed that he was nervous when my green eyes fell on him.

“Are you afraid of the result of the project?” I asked him as he finished smoothing the non-existent wrinkles of his white shirt.

"No, it's not that ..." he said, breathing deeply. “Well, I wouldn't like our kids to be too disappointed in what they did if we didn't win. They worked a lot with the book, Ash. I think they have really made a beautiful book.”

"I know, Max has several offers from different publishing houses to give the book more diffusion outside the University," I said, unable to avoid feeling proud of our students. “We have done a good job, Professor Okumura, our students are geniuses.”

“I know...”

"Then, no nerves. I want you to smile, okay? I bet everyone will want to see you smile today, after all, some of our students won't have the chance to see you again.”

 

“You´re the one they're going to miss. They won't have the opportunity to look at someone like you every day. Ash, you're too handsome today, have I told you that?”

“Really?”  I asked without being able to avoid feeling my cheeks light up completely.

That is to say, I knew that my blue suit really fit perfectly with the whiteness of my skin and that the color of the fabric made my green eyes take a surprising depth but you know something? I still don't quite get used to know that in Eiji Okumura's eyes I am always the most beautiful man in the universe.

"Really, Professor Callenreese," he said, kissing me softly. “You are so beautiful, Aslan.”

"You don't give yourself enough credit, Professor Okumura," I said, stroking his face. “You also look so handsome today that I would like to hide you from the world because you already know that I am a jealous shit.”

My words made Eiji laugh and that's how we both finally left our department holding hands and feeling a huge love for each other in our hearts.

So far, Shorter, I swear I would have been happy all month remembering the early hours of this morning but the universe had more surprises for me yet to come. And it was that when Eiji and I finally got away from the enormous excitement that had surrounded us upon receiving recognition for the best multidisciplinary project of the year, I realized that Professor Okumura was still lost in that state of adorable nervousness that makes him look very young.

It was at that moment that I began to wonder if Eiji was feeling well. At that moment I remembered that the uneasy state of Eiji had begun last night and I was about to ask him about it when, without saying anything else, Eiji took my hand again and led me to the center of the main garden of the Faculty of Fine Arts that at that time, and because all the people were out of the auditorium celebrating with their graduates, looked somewhat desolate.

Eiji looked me straight in the eye at that moment and I swear that when the black of his pupils stuck in the green of mine, my heart started beating like crazy, it was as if my heart had suspected all that time what my mind barely imagined. And then, Shorter, I felt that I was really starting to get dizzy when Eiji's adorable smile, that smile that ended up stealing my heart, appeared on his lips.

And then I knew something was going to happen, that I was about to live one of those dreams that I had never dared to dream about. In that instant I knew that my world would transform once again and that Eiji would be the cause. Because he and I were right in that place where I looked at him for the first time. We were both in the right place where the existence of the other had been revealed to us a year ago, what seems like an eternity now. I wasn't scared, Shorter, really not. However I couldn't help but shiver in anticipation because my heart also had a very good idea about what would happen next.

"My Aslan ..." Eiji said in a firm and sweet voice that electrified my skin. “I'm sorry but I couldn't wait any longer.”

"Waiting more?" I asked without letting go of his hands. "Why?"

 

"To ask you something important," he said with a nervous smile that caused the blood in my body to clump on my cheeks. “I'm so scared right now.”

"Are you afraid of me?" I asked feeling nervous as well.

"No, of course not ..." he said and his laugh came out a little more confident from his lips.

“So?”

"I'm afraid that the question I want to ask and the way I will do it is not what you deserve, Ash. But I will still take the risk because it would be a sin to silence what I feel any further.”

"Eiji, what is it ...?"

I didn't have time to ask him more, Shorter. At the right moment when the last words came out of my lips, Eiji released my hands simply to kneel before me with a gold ring between his fingers. I swear my breath was cut completely. I swear that at that moment the world around me seemed to blur to come together in the image of Eiji in front of me: his eyes full of brightness, full of stars; his lips curved in a smile full of love and finally, our bodies surrounded by summer flowers of a thousand colors. Eiji looked beautiful there, in front of me, so brave and ready to ask me the same question I planned to ask.

I wanted to cry, Shorter, I'm not going to deny it to you. I wanted to cry because although he had not yet asked his question, I already knew that there was only one answer for him. I wanted to cry because I felt happy, because the man I love and the man who loves me had decided to join his life to mine and nobody had told me that something like that would be possible. And he, my Eiji, he was there about to make another dream come true for both of us. I wanted to kiss him, I wanted to shout at him that I loved him, that probably nobody in the world had ever loved the way I love him. I wanted to tell him that I didn't mind having lived under a winter blanket most of my life because he had brought spring to me.

I felt that I would die of love at that moment, Shorter, and then I remembered that dying is easy, we will all die someday so I decided to be brave and smile. I wanted to smile because in no way was I going to miss the rest of my life next to Eiji Okumura.

"My Ash ..." he said while still looking me in the eye. “I know I should have prepared an even better surprise for you. I know I should have done something spectacular and unforgettable but I think this will be too, don't you think? Because the acts of love are always magical regardless of their scenario, because what matters is not the place but the person you meet, that person who makes every little moment something incredible, something full of magic. Since I looked at you for the first time, Ash, maybe from the moment I read one of your novels I knew that my life had been created simply to join yours. I'm sure of it, Ash, I'm so sure of the love I feel for you that that's why I wanted to take the risk of buying an engagement ring and ask you to share the path that awaits us to be traveled. I want to wake up every day by your side, I want to see rainy afternoons next to you, feeling your hand in my hand. I want you to be with me when the cherry trees blossom in Japan and I want to go with you wherever you want to go because from now on, if you accept me, my home will always be the place where you are. I can't imagine my life away from you. I don't want to waste any of my nights without breathing the perfume of your body in my arms. So Aslan Jade Callenreese, my Aslan, do you want to be my husband and my partner for life? Do you want to build a home and a family by my side? Do you want to marry me at the New York Public Library? Ash, will you…?

I didn't let him finish his question, it was simply impossible for me to be away from him for just one more minute, so I knelt before him too and with a smile full of joy in my arms I pulled the ring I´d bought to Eiji from my right pocket, the jewel that I had prepared for him because all this time I had taken it with me as if it were a good luck charm. Eiji smiled in the most beautiful way you can imagine seeing my flower of precious jewels and warm tears began to roll down her face.

"No, Eiji, don't cry ..." I said getting closer to him. “I think we were both planning the same thing for many days, don't you think? It is true that our souls are always united, that our desires correspond even in what we do not say. You know that I love you, that you are my first and only love and I don't want it to be otherwise so don't cry. Of course I accept being your life partner, nothing would make me happier than being able to call you my husband in the future. So let me put this ring on your finger, okay? And put yours in my hand, Eiji, because in the same way that I will take care of that jewel, I will also take care of your heart. Eiji Okumura, I want to marry you, do you want to be my husband too?

"Yes, I do ..." he replied.

After that, I put the flower ring on his finger and just as I imagined, Shorter, it's perfect for him. Then, Eiji put on my own finger this beautiful ring that reminds me of our eyes united in a look of love and after kissing him, we separated just to realize that a group of students were throwing flower petals on both of us, petals of flowers that somehow symbolized that spring that had finally arrived, that spring that was hidden between our fingers, the spring that was born from our love. A lot of people were surrounding us for the moment when I hugged Eiji tightly. I know that everyone applauded, cheered and took wholesale photographs. I was so lost in my happiness and near Eiji that none of that could have mattered less.

Eiji was the whole world that mattered to me, Eiji and the promise we both just made was the only thing of value to me. So I kept hugging him, kept kissing him, kept saying his name as if it were a protective enchantment. And happiness was there, Shorter, happiness in fact, stayed with me from that moment until now in which my eyes wander from my engagement ring to the serene and thin figure of my Eiji who sleeps with a smile on his lips surely dreaming of the life we will both build.

I am happy, Shorter. Just now, I doubt there is another man as happy as me. Because the love of my life will unite his existence to mine. Because love is no longer a dream, it is a reality and surrounded by that love is that my soul that has healed slowly, will flourish now.

I feel that the whole story that Eiji and I have lived so far is nothing more than a preface, Shorter. I believe that all we have lived so far in our history is that chapter that will be called _"before our spring"_ because what will come now, what we both will live now will be that blooming garden that neither of us will let die even when the winter comes to us.

What comes next in our lives, Shorter, is spring and from today, best man, you are invited to be happy for Eiji and me in the midst of all the flowers that we will surely have on our wedding day.

 

I'm going to marry Eiji Okumura, Shorter!

Love, Aslan Jade Callenreese-Okumura

(DON'T YOU BELIEVE THAT MY NAME IMPROVES A LOT WHEN YOU ADD “OKUMURA” TO IT? IT IS A THOUSAND TIMES MORE PERFECT! 😍😍😍)

 


	52. Subject: HE SAID YES!

**From: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**To: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**Subject: HE SAID YES.**

 

Yue, Ash said yes. I said yes. We will get married next spring and it would be an honor if you help me planning the wedding. I feel so happy, Yue!

I attach two of the photographs that our students took after my proposal because I truly believe they are beautiful and will give you an idea of the degree of my happiness. It was magical, Yue, it was beautiful. I'll call you to tell you everything about the proposal as soon as I send this e-mail because yesterday I was too lost in my happiness to be eloquent.

 

I'm going to marry Aslan Jade Callenreese, Yue! ❤

Now you can really call me Mrs. Callenreese! ❤

 Love, Eiji

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> These drawings were the work of my friend Noemi and I feel very happy that she helped me with them so I can show them here. I hope you like them too, I love them a lot :3


	53. Invitation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The quotation at the very begining of the invitation is from the poem "I love you" by Mario Benedetti.


	54. Subject: I am so happy for you, big brother.

**From: okumura.kaori@gmail.com**

**To: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**Subject: I am so happy for you, big brother.**

 

My beloved older brother:

Just a few hours ago you and my new brother left Japan but I already feel that I miss you so much, you know? Meeting Ash and being able to hug you once again was the most beautiful thing that happened to me during these two weeks that you were with me.

When I saw you, I could hardly believe that it was more than two years since we had the opportunity to be together and face to face. You must forgive me for having cried like a fool but I missed you so much, Eiji, I missed you from the first moment our parents forbade you to enter the family home again. I wouldn't want to mention this now that you're so happy, but I'm still mad at them for their foolishness. I think the next time I go home, the three of us will have a serious talk. It's time for mom and dad to stop being fools. It is time that they understand that you are a wonderful child for them and that they are both who do not deserve to call you part of their family.

I know you say you don't need them because you have already found a family for you, Eiji, but I want them to realize the beautiful son they are letting out. You have made your life a wonderful existence, Eiji. Since I was a child, there hasn't been a single day when I haven't felt happy for being your sister. You were always my refuge, my best friend and I know that I have never told you because I am too shy to tell you many things.

However, it was Ash's idea to write all what I don't have too much strength to tell you when I´m looking at your eyes. Ash idea actually inspired me to be brave and write you this. Your fiancé is a wonderful man too and I think I will start loving him very soon because he makes you happy the same way you make him happy.

You are right to say that your Aslan is a powerful dawn, I think it is that dawn that was somehow missing in your life. I feel extremely happy to know that in this universe there is someone who loves you with all his heart. If you could only realize the way in which Ash and you look at each other. Eiji, you look at each other as if an entire universe of light and heat was being born between your eyes.

Hopefully someday someone can look at me like that, it's something beautiful. But let's not talk about me, big brother. I feel happy that you have that because it's all that my favorite super hero deserves. Nor had I told you that you were always that to me, hadn´t I? Although you always say that it is I who defended you from fear on stormy nights, actually seeing you fly was what always gave me the courage to keep on dreaming myself. You're my best role model, Eiji, it's you who always reminds me that I can't stop fighting.

You know? Yesterday, while you talked with Mr. Ibe and the two exchanged new secrets about the art of photography, Ash and I were watching you both from afar with the same smile full of love for you on the lips. I don't know if you've noticed it before, but your Ash isn't able to stop looking at you for a second, it's like his green eyes always feel summoned to you. It really is beautiful to see how he looks at you, I even felt like an intruder to see him look at you like that.

“Was your brother always this handsome?” he asked me making me laugh.

"Yes, all my friends were in love with him in high school," I replied and I had a little fun watching Ash frown annoyedly.

“Did he have many girlfriends, then?” asked Ash and I really wanted to hug him because it is lovely to see him jealous.

"No, Eiji was too in love with pole vaulting to look at someone else," I replied calmly. “I think you are my Eiji's first love.”

“Am I?” he told me and his green eyes filled with light when he heard me say those words.

"Yes, I swear, big brother ..." I replied without thinking.

“Big brother?” he asked me with his eyes full of light and seriously Eiji, he asked that question with such longing that I wondered what the reason was for it.

"Well, you and Eiji are engaged now. When the two of you are married, you will be my older brother too. Although if I bothered you by calling you that, I'm sorry, Ash, is that ... I always say things without thinking, it's a problem sometimes, I know.”

"It's just that nobody had called me that before, Kaori," he said affectionately, he pronounced my name as if he had known me forever. “It will be an honor to be part of your family, I mean it. Actually, I was so scared of not being good enough for Eiji, I was afraid that you would think I was not the right man to make your brother happy.”

"You are," I said looking into his eyes. “You are all that my brother loves, and that's enough for me, big brother. I know you will, but I must take my parents' place anyway and tell you that you should take good care of him. Eiji is a good man, he is sweet, he is strong and he is adorable. Make him happy all his life and you and I won't have problems, okay? Because if you make him cry, I think that Yut-Lung Lee and I will have to make you disappear from the world.”

"Are you also friends with his highness?" Ash asked me amusedly. “He has already threatened me at least fifteen times so far this month. He said that if I wasn't a husband good enough for Eiji, he will kill me and use my head as a box sack.”

"Yes, our Yue is a bit exaggerated with the ways in which he expresses his love ..."

“A little?”

"You understand me, we can't disrespect the Dragon Lord of the Lee clan," I said laughing.“But besides that, I think we both have a pending talk, Mr. Callenreese.”

"I hear you, Miss Okumura ..."

"Well, I really want to tell you this, so listen to me carefully: I know Eiji is happy by your side but I also want you to be. I want you to know that as of today you are part of my family and I will worry about you and take care of you. I will be a good sister to you, Ash, so if one day you feel sad or you and Eiji fight and you don't know who to talk to, remember that in Japan there is a part of your family, will you? Until you and Eiji come to live to Izumo definitively as is your plan, remember that you are not alone and that Mr. Ibe and I are part of your family too.”

I could have said more things to Aslan. I hope you're not ashamed that I told him all that, but I had to let him know what I felt, Eiji. He has always been alone, hasn't he? There is something in his green eyes that still hurts and I know that makes you sad too, and that something is all that loneliness that he has had to endure throughout his life.

That's why I had to let him know that from now on he is an Okumura and that while our parents are fools, he is already part of our life and our history. That's why I told him, that's why I let him know all those things and if I didn't say more, it was because he surprised me by taking my hand over the table and with a firm squeeze he let me know that my words had done him well.

He is my older brother too and what I said was not in vain, it was not a game. Although the two are older than me, Eiji, I want you to remember that there will always be people around who will protect them, all those people who will see them joining their lives next spring. All of us who love you will always take care of you. We will all be witnesses and guardians of this spring love that has united you and him both. Don't forget it, will you?

By the way, you're a hopeless romantic, did you know that? I think you chose a beautiful date to get married, it is a pity that Ash and you are not going to do it here in Japan while the cherry trees sprout with splendor and color, in the same way I imagine, the love of the two sprouted. However, I fully understand why you want to get married at the New York Public Library. In addition, our Yue is doing wonderful things next to the three wedding planners he hired. Seriously Eiji, I think you and Aslan will have a princely wedding and it's so beautiful to think about it.

I think I'll melt on your wedding day!

You and Aslan will have a wonderful start, Eiji, and I know that you will build a precious life for both of you. And I am happy to witness the triumph of a great love like the one you two share. During these weeks in which the two have been by my side, I think that I have once again believed in love. I have come back to believe that if you are brave you can find a way to reach any dream. You and Ash make me believe in fragrant springs and skies full of light. Seriously Eiji, nobody can look at you for more than two seconds without feeling that love is more than a fairy tale.

That's why right now I feel I miss you. That's why I wish time goes by quickly so that I can go to New York and witness the wedding of the century. I feel so happy for you, Eiji, that during these days I will go to the temple near my university daily to pray because no one in the universe takes away this love that came into your life to make it a thousand times better.

Do not forget that I am always with you, will you? Do not forget that I feel proud every day of the man you have become because you are a man full of love. I wish I could have given you more hugs to not miss you so much. I love you with all my heart, big brother. Call me more often and tell me how the wedding plans are going, will you? Although I am far away, I do not want to miss anything and I know that Yut-Lung will not tell me more details because this wedding is like his personal work of art and he wants everything to be a surprise for all the guests of the ceremony and the huge party that surely we will have later. Don't be mean to me and keep track of everything, okay?

Loves you always, Kaori.


	55. Subject: One month left for my wedding!

**From: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**To: shorter.wong@gmail.com**

**Subject: One month left for my wedding!**

 

Dear Shorter:

I apologize for being absent for most of the year that just started three months ago. You should know that lately I have not felt the need to write to you mainly because we are in contact most of the time, especially now that Yue has put us all in this fuss of rehearsals for my wedding ceremony. I know he wants everything to be perfect because he will write an article for the Vogue magazine since it seems that the wedding of a super sales author and an internationally famous photographer cannot go unnoticed for all of New York. I will only cooperate with this madness because Yue will illustrate his article with photos of Eiji and my future husband is really excited about the project and you know that for him, there is nothing that I could not do.

However, I seriously still think that your cousin is a heavy one, I don't understand why we have to please the public eye with this but that's fine, I won't argue with him because I don't mind sharing my happiness with the rest of the world, I don't care if a hundred or a million people know about my wedding because the only one I will see at that moment will be my Eiji. My wedding will be perfect because my fiancé is perfect, what else does your majesty want?

Seriously, I am sometimes scared of his _bridezilla_ attitude by organizing this wedding. Who would have every right to be a neurotic boyfriend is me, don't you think? I suppose it is an unwritten law of all the people who are about to marry that one of the grooms goes crazy but in this case, I think that Eiji and I are the quietest and most peaceful couple of future spouses in the universe.

Since we announced our engagement to everyone, all the mess of organizing the ceremony and the party was taken by Yut-Lung and I, who had not known where to start planning an event of the monstrous magnitude that his majesty is preparing, I left everything in his hands. Eiji says that nothing makes Yue happier than giving orders left and right and now I believe it. Although when he yells at us, I really want to tell him to breathe, because if the man dies of stress because of me, I know that Sing Soo Ling will kill me.

Despite Yue's neurosis attacks, I think I will really have one of the most beautiful weddings in history, it is impossible not to see beauty in all the advances that your cousin has made. While it is true that nothing is still completed, the hall of the New York Public Library where we´ll have our ceremony looks amazing. It is enough for me to see the photographs that Eiji sends to Kaori, those photographs that Yut-Lung does not know that my fiancé takes without him noticing. Eiji promised his sister that he would keep her up to date with every little advance and you know that my beloved never makes a promise just because.

Also, I think my Eiji wants to save thousands of memories, you know? It's as if he wanted to create a huge album from moments before the big day. And it seems adorable to me to do it, but of course, there is nothing more adorable than Eiji Okumura in this world so maybe I am being a bit impartial.

I want to marry him, Shorter, I'm not even nervous about the day. The truth is that I have written my marriage vows again and again. With each passing day I add two or three more lines and even Max Lobo has told me that at this rate, I will have to give Eiji a new printed novel instead of a reasonable list of promises of love. Of course, old Max is an overstatement, although there are days when I think I should moderate myself a little.

But I can't, Shorter, I just can't. The emotion that runs through my veins when I think of Eiji joining his life to mine on a radiant spring day makes me feel a thousand things that I have to write. In fact, I am more than sure that I will write a love novel very soon, a novel that tells the story of Eiji and how he and his light changed my life completely. I want to write our story, Shorter, although I have told you the story of both of us through these emails for almost two years now, I think that my heart will not be at peace until with words I enroll Eiji and me in the book collection that lies in the New York Public Library.

They say that when a writer falls in love, the destiny of the beloved is to be eternal. When you become words, something of you stays forever in the sacred shelter of ink and paper. I want to be eternal with Eiji, Shorter. I want the whole world to know about our love because I know that there must be people out there who need to know that if even someone like me let himself be found for the love of his life, everything is possible. Yes, I have become a hopeless romantic but no. Hope is what fills my heart from the moment Eiji came into my life. I am a romantic full of faith and love that is what I am.

So sorry, best friend, you'll have to read a sweet novel at the end of the day. But no, I don't want to apologize for anything anymore. I do not feel ashamed of my feelings, I am no longer afraid, I am already able to face my own pain and succeed in the traps of my mind.

That is why in recent days I have also been thinking about letting Jessica Randy rest from the enormous work of having me as her patient. I think the honeymoon he had with Max at the end of last year has finally paid off. The two will have a child within four months and I am so happy to see my therapist happy that I know she deserves to be allowed to enjoy this stage of her life with one less patient. I think I'm ready, Shorter. While the demons that we keep in the mind and soul are not defeated forever, I am sure that right now I have the strength to face them. Because Eiji is by my side, because I still have so much life to live by his side.

I've already talked to Jessica too and she thinks she can discharge me in a few more months, I guess after my honeymoon and before Eiji and I go to Japan permanently. It will be nice to close this part of my life too, it will be beautiful to put a full period in this process from which I have learned so much, in which I have healed so much as well.

I'm glad I'm not a broken man anymore, you know? Because Eiji deserves a complete man next to him or at least that man who can now show off his scars with pride because without all the pain we suffer, Shorter, today I would not be this man I became and this man, everything what I am is what Eiji loves. He loves me as I am. He will love me all my life and when I think of something like that, who the hell can feel fear?

That is why the desire to advance time invades me. I already want to live that ceremony in which Max Lobo will be with me at the altar while I wait for Eiji, who will walk next to Kaori and Mr. Ibe. Yes, you read that right: Max Lobo will take my father's place because he is the only father I know, Shorter. Max always took care of me. He protected me and educated me first as a son and then as a writer so I couldn't ask anyone else. The fool cried when I asked him to come with me, can you believe it? An adult man crying like that in excitement. The truth is that I also felt moved because after all, I will be surrounded by a lot of love in my wedding ceremony and that includes you, best man.

By the way, I hate you for marrying Cain Blood in Las Vegas, how could you do that to me? Why the hell didn't you let me be your best man too? You always do everything impulsively Shorter, but I think Nadia's happiness makes up to you. I think nobody is happier than your sister to see that you have finally settle down. I'm glad you found your life partner too and you know that I wish you all the happiness this world can give you because you deserve it, you deserve it so much.

My heart becomes a bigger place when I realize that the abused and injured children who found refuge in each other's friendship are now men full of love. Nothing could destroy our ability to love Shorter, don't you think that's something precious? We are strong and deserve all this joy. We deserve it, Shorter and I know that we will both continue fighting to have the happy life that every human being deserves to have.

Anyway, dear, I must leave you now. Eiji has already arrived at the department and I'm dying to see the wedding invitations that we will send to everyone today. I think we will have a conference call with Kaori who said he wanted to be the first to see the invitations no matter if it is early in Japan at this precise moment. Don't worry, we'll send yours as soon as I stop laughing like an idiot out of happiness. I swear.

 One month left for my wedding, don't forget it!

 

Love, Ash.


	56. Subject: Tomorrow.

**From: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**To: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**Subject: Tomorrow.**

I will marry you tomorrow, Ash.

Recently my sister and Yue fell asleep on the comfortable carpet in the hotel room where I had that party that Yue insisted on calling "my bachelor party."

No, you shouldn't worry. I know it wasn't funny that our friends insisted on separating us tonight so we could both have a traditional Western wedding. But come on, nothing happened that usually happens in these events according to American films. Actually Yue, Kaori and I were remembering happy moments of our story together while we drank some of the shots that my sister has learned to prepare at the bar near the university where she works. It was fun, it really was. The three of us laughed and joked until we ended up crying.

Don't you think it's strange? It is so simple to move from the happiest laugh to the deepest tears. We weren't crying in sadness, I think we were happy, I'm still happy. I had to hold Yue and Kaori's hands because I felt an enormous joy in my chest, an intense happiness that I could never put into words. I think that was the reason for our crying, there was too much happiness in us and we could not express it otherwise.

Because suddenly, in the middle of our laughter and the memories of my old glories, the fact that I will marry you in less than ten hours hit me. I'm going to marry you, how did I get to be the one you love? Was it magic? How did I get someone like you to notice me? I think that will be the greatest mystery of my life but to some mysteries are not necessary to be revealed so I will simply live it, I will live my whole life with you.

Tomorrow, when my dark eyes remain fixed on you it will be the last time I will look at you as my fiancé and when we both pronounce our vows, you will become my husband. I will be Aslan Jade Callenreese husband. I can't stop smiling at the thought of it.

I already want to see you wearing your wedding attire, I know that it will give me an attack when I look at you, I know that I will want to pass out and surely my eyes will be filled with tears when I contemplate you. But no, my Aslan, I will not cry. We have already cried many times and I will not do it tomorrow.

Because tomorrow I will start writing another chapter of our story by your side and I will do it with the spring on my lips. So I will smile at you. I will smile at you like a new world, I will smile at you like the flowers smile at the sun. I love you so much right now. I love you like nobody else will love in this world because there is simply no one like you.

But well, everything I want to tell you, I'll tell you tomorrow. Please smile at me and make me want to run into your arms even if Yue would want to kill me if I dare to ruin the beautiful ceremony he prepared for both of us.

Our eternity will start being written tomorrow, Ash.

Thank you for deciding to write that always with me.

I will see you tomorrow, future husband. I'll be the one in the dark suit and the bouquet of red roses, don't forget it.

 

I´ll love you forever, Eiji.


	57. Subject: In an hour.

**From: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**To: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**Subject: In an hour.**

I will marry you in an hour.

Max and Shorter - who I think were holding back the tears when they saw me - have left the room where I have already put on my wedding suit. You'll like it, I chose it thinking of you and the way you always tell me it is illegal for me to wear a dark suit. There will also be sunflowers in my hands because I know you love those flowers. I will not disappoint you, I really believe that today I look more handsome than ever and I want you to think that I am the most beautiful man in the world, I want there to be nothing else in your eyes than me when I can look at you again.

I am selfish, I know, I am also ambitious. Right now, I look at my engagement ring and I can't help but want to go looking for you even though I know that Yue practically locked you in a super-secret place to prevent me from going out to find you. He did well. I am so eager to take your hands in mine once again that I can barely contain myself. I want to put our wedding ring on your finger. No, you will not have to stop using your engagement ring because I know you love it, our golden wedding rings are more a complement to the two jewels we already have.

This hour, the last one before calling you my husband will be very long. In an hour I will join my life to yours in front of all the people who are important to both of us but do you want me to tell you a secret? I think our lives were always united, since the first time I looked at you. If on that day I had known that you would become my entire world, I would not have believed it. You are a surprise to me, you always will be. You are my forever because that was my destiny and even if it is a mystery, Eiji, I will live it with you.

How do you look now? Will I also melt when I see you wearing an elegant black suit? I have no doubt that you are the most adorable and perfect groom in the history of the universe and that is why I wish time was running fast now. I want to see you, I'm dying to see you.

I know that when I look at you walking down that corridor full of flowers and crystals that Yue prepared, something in my heart will go into combustion and watching you walk towards me with red flowers in your hands will make me think of all the springs that I will live with you. We will have a long and happy life. We will have so many dreams to fulfill yet.

However, right now I feel that I don't want any other dream than you. I want to swear an eternal love to you and only you because maybe love and eternity mean the same thing in our dictionary.

I want to call you mine although I know that possession is an illusion. I want to tell everyone that from today you will be Eiji Okumura-Callenreese. I want to tell you that there will be no winters by your side. I want everyone to know that the little boy who was always doomed to pain right now doesn't remember any of that. Because by your side I am happiness. By your side my past does not matter because I will have an entire future to write a love story with you.

I want to be your husband now. I´m counting down the minutes to call you my husband. Walk to me without fear, will you? Walk to me knowing that in my arms you will find the love you have always dreamed of all your life.

I will see you in a few minutes, my future husband, my love, my Eiji.

 

With eternal love, Aslan.


	58. From the book "Before our spring"

**From the book "Before our spring"**

**By Aslan Jade Callenreese-Okumura.**

**Chapter 25. Blooming**

 

Do you remember when you were a child?

You told yourself once and a thousand times before the day of your wedding that you would never remember it and yet, being surrounded by flowers and the serene smiles of all the people who accompany you in which it is undoubtedly one of the most important days of your existence, you can't help looking back.

There are those who say that in the midst of the deepest happiness there is also a huge hint of sadness, that bittersweet nostalgia born from knowing that in your life there will not be a moment of brilliant happiness like the one you are having in this exact moment. We miss what is about to happen, we miss what has not happened yet and of course, in the midst of the most sublime bliss you also remember what is no longer with you.

It is at that moment, while looking at yourself surrounded by flowers and crystals, that you imagine what it would have been like if your older brother had been there, with you. Surely his smile would be the same one that is now drawn on the lips of the man who grew up with you, Shorter Wong, your best man and the best friend you could have asked the world. To your right, Max Lobo tries to endure the tears, those same tears that he also cried when interviewing you, the tears that he cried when in the middle of your narration of the tragic story of your childhood, he took your hands and asked you for forgiveness for not having come to you before, for not being able to rescue you faster.

Yes, surely Griffin would have smiled the same. Griffin would have put your hand on Eiji´s hand. Griffin would have told you that he is proud of you in the same way he used to tell you that he was the proudest brother in the universe when you gave him the neat drawings you used to do in kindergarten before everything collapsed around you. Your older brother would have been happy for you and surely he and Eiji would have got along great because Griffin was also warm, always with a big smile on his lips.

And in the midst of the enormity of that room that now looks like an enchanted garden in which thousands of sweet aromas float in the air is that you seem to see him, your brother and he´s there too. He accompanies you, his presence is like a warm echo besides you that seems to tell you: _"You have done well, my little Aslan, you have done well and I feel so happy that you have known love. Eiji will always take care of you. While the world snatched you so much without you deserving it, it has also rewarded you, don't you think? I am fine, Aslan, in the stars nobody knows of pain so I want you to know that I am with you and that in Max's hand it will also be my hand because I will deliver you to your love, I will bless your union and take care of both of you and the history that the two will always write. "_

Your eyes are dampened with those thoughts while around you a murmur of expectation rises while the master of ceremonies that Yue hired, that handsome and elegant man who announces that the ceremony is about to begin, orders that the string trio begin with the song that will accompany the walk of that man who came into your life to change everything.

Suddenly, the sadness that nested in your chest takes the form of crazy beats because you know that your Eiji is close to you. The day the two spent separated seemed like an eternity to you and you realized how much it costs you not to see his adorable smile or his long black hair falling like fine rain on your chest in the mornings. You want to see him, you want to see him so much that Shorter has to nudge you so that you refrain from running in middle of that corridor decorated with cherry blossom branches, roses of various colors and bright yellow sunflowers.

Yut-Lung Lee did a superb job. Yut-Lung Lee was able to create spring in the middle of a thousand books. Yut-Lung Lee was able to put in the decoration of a place so loved for you, all that Eiji Okumura means in your existence.

You are about to marry the love of your life. How many people are as lucky as you to be able to say something like that? Not many, there should not be many and then your heart beats more strongly with the first piano and cello chords that are heard in the middle of the place while a door opens and through it appears the most perfect vision of a world with no winter, no loneliness, no sadness: black hair falling free and long down his back, slim and elegant figure trapped under the softness of a dark suit and red roses in his hands. Eiji Okumura and his adorable smile. Eiji Okumura whose name must be synonymous with infinity too, is finally in front of you.

He is there, he is really there and he will unite his life with yours. Tears threaten to overflow your eyes once more but you fight against them. In the email that Eiji sent you at night he told you that he would not cry and you want to correspond to his bravery although it is really difficult not to feel moved to tears by such beauty or by the light of his dark eyes that even in the distance, they seem to be illuminating the entire room. Surely Eiji's eyes hide a universe, that universe where you can always meet him.

The music plays and you have to hold the sunflowers of your hands with more strength because you know you have to wait for him. Eiji will come to you, he will arrive in front of you in the same way he did the first time you looked at him: without warning, without waiting for him but always making his way to you.

The strings continue to sound and make music that does not seem like it is from this world and while your emerald eyes are filled with the image of the man who will become a forever for you, you let the lyrics of the song flood you and say for you some of the things that Eiji Okumura always makes you feel:

 

_As we walk our way through this fragrant season, I hear the cautious sound of my steps in my mind_.

_As you walk to me and I watch you smile, it's as if all the happiness in the world was mine._

_The afternoon sun awakens my heart and I am only able to smile._

 

_Although we don't know what the future will bring, I don't want this moment to be just a dream._

_You are my only love and I hope to walk the same path with you._

_Although the future may change us, we will not let go of our hands._

_Just for love, let’s this be our last love forever, it's what I want._

_Your love is something precious to me, it's true._

_Let's look at each other, stay by my side._

_This is what I need to complete my dreams_

_You make my life complete…_

Yes, Eiji Okumura completes your life but he also does more than that. Eiji Okumura actually makes your life something a thousand times more beautiful, more complex. Eiji makes every day an adventure and every second an expression of love. And you love him so much. At that moment you love him so much that you know that the universe must be celebrating. Because a love like the one you feel should be that light that gives meaning to the deepest darkness. Because the love of your life is about to reach you from the hand of your sister and her best friend who also seem to be fighting tears.

One, two, three more steps and he will be in front of you.

Eiji smiles now, how he smiles! You still think that it should be illegal to be able to smile like this: as if there was no darkness in the world, as if nobody in the world knew of pain and death.

He smiles because his happiness is you. He smiles because his sister hugs him now and then takes his hand to put it in yours and Max Lobo also accompanies you in that small ritual step of union that seems to alter the world to its foundations: Eiji's hand is now in yours and you know that means that Kaori Okumura trusts you to make him happy and that Max is also blessing your union with Eiji.

A collective sigh arises among all those present while the families of the two go to their places: Max and Kaori to the front row, Yue next to Shorter.

And when you feel united with Eiji in body and soul, in that moment in which also the black and the emerald green converge in the same look in love, it is as if the two summoned the silence that had to be heard before the creation of the universe. All eyes are on you as the elegant minister begins with the ceremony saying that that day everyone has been gathered in the middle of the New York Public Library to celebrate the triumph of a great love that does not know about nationalities, or of genres, nor of those meaningless things that can never stop the birth of love.

The words the minister says are beautiful but you have stopped listening to him. You wonder what your Eiji should be thinking and you smile when you realize that in his eyes you are able to read his deepest feelings. He is thinking that he loves you and that you are too beautiful for your own good and the constancy of that idea makes your cheeks blush deeply and Mr. Ibe takes right and left pictures of Eiji's hands and yours together, both creating a small garden with his fingers that have not released the red roses or the sunflowers.

Eiji also thinks that from one moment to another he will fly out the window. Eiji feels that his heart is too big for his chest. Every beat of his heart screams your name. Every breath of his is full of you. He loves you, it seems that Eiji's eyes just invented love for both of you. You are his happiness and then you smile. Everything will be fine, says your brother's voice, everything will be fine because the both of you will live their lives trusting the love of the two blindly.

It is at that moment that the minister's speech addresses both of you. You hear him say that you must pronounce your vows and you are not surprised at all to read in Eiji's gaze that he will speak first. Of the two, he is the bravest, isn't he? He always went to you, he was never afraid to take the first step and you don't feel worthy of him. But love is not a merit contest right?

Eiji is love and you prepare to listen to it because you know that his words are music, heavenly music that will speak of the eternity of the waves of the sea and the stars:

"My Aslan, my dawn ..." he says and you feel a chill at hearing your name pronounced with sweetness and softness on his lips. “A poet once said that men could cut all the flowers of the universe but still, they can never stop spring *. Our love was like that, don't you think so? In the middle of your longest winter, that winter that often resisted abandoning your heart, was that I came into your life. The truth is that I don't remember the exact moment I fell in love with you forever. I mean, I could tell you about all the moments I remember by your side when I looked at you and felt that something infinite was sprouting in me. And I think, my Aslan, that my love for you was a small seed that later became a bud and that right now it is a fragrant flower in my heart. A single flower can be called spring and the love I feel for you is like this: a season that will always protect you and keep you from the cold. Where your heart hurts, I will lay my hands and plant flowers, not to make you forget but to always remember that even where there are wounds, everything can flourish. I will always bloom by your side. I will take care of you. When you are tired I will comfort you, I´ll feed your soul and your whole being. You are the love that destiny had prepared for me and I want you to know that loving you is my personal miracle. Once upon a time, we both talked about darkness and stars and I told you that you are my universe full of light. That will always be you, Ash, you will always be the sky in which my wings will open without fear. Fly with me always, will you? Always fly with me because we will always have wings to travel, to love, to continue creating. Today, my Aslan, I swear my love and my faithfulness forever. I swear I'll always try to make you happy. So don't be afraid to fly: my wings will be your refuge and my love will always hold you until my end.”

His words resonate again amidst the silence. You notice that Yue cries and that his eyes are fixed on Sing-So Ling's and you would also like to cry because as always, Eiji's words have a sweeping beauty. You are about to tell him to forget your vows, that he has already said everything but you know that this is not the best time to have one of the many writer's blockages that Eiji usually causes you. This time you want the whole world to listen to you, you want everyone to know what he means to you. But more than anything, you want to tell him out loud all those things that you have not been able to tell him since he came into your life, all that poetry that you keep inside your chest for him, just for him.

"My Eiji, my beloved", you say without hesitation, losing yourself in his eyes and in the touch of his hands that grows stronger around your fingers. “Since I met you I have not stopped thinking and talking about you because I believe that one simply cannot silence what gives meaning to his universe. From the first time I looked at you something inside of me seemed to transform. I think that all the tremor inside me when you came to me was the noise of my walls collapsing to let you come into me. You came to me as spring comes into the world: fragrant, warm, full of color and also of mystery. All the flowers that I thought were dead inside me began to be born with the warmth of your eyes and although the new life sometimes hurts, although spring must be born from winter, you helped me not to be afraid. You chased away my demons with the strength of your arms. You adorned my scars with the gold of your strength. You taught me that I should not be ashamed of my pain or my past, that I could not get rid of my demons without hugging them. You made me strong, you make me strong with each passing day. Beside you, that man who, all his life, believed himself a lonely leopard on the snowy peaks of an endless mountain, has finally become a storyteller who believes in love, who lives love every day to your side. Eiji, my adorable Eiji who smiles with the glow of the stars on his lips, thank you for choosing me. Thank you for loving me the way you do. Thank you for looking me in the eye and telling me that you will always stay with me because you have never been afraid to promise me eternity. I know you discovered that eternity is both of us. That in the midst of our human finitude it is our immortal souls that will always be together. Always, Eiji, I will stay with you always. That is my promise. Being with you is my reason for living. Only death could separate us now but I know that I will find you in as many lives as I have to look for you. Our souls will always be united so fear not, my love, nothing will take me away from you. We are one now, we will be one tomorrow, we will be an always forever.”

Your words come to Eiji as a caress and he receives them as one who keeps a treasure in his heart. Your beloved's eyes remain fixed on you while Shorter takes the flowers from both of your hands and Yut-Lung approaches the two with a blue velvet cushion in his hands. Your wedding rings wait for you there. These rings are the sign of a love that will never end.

"Mr. Okumura," says the minister in a voice full of emotion and strength, "Do you accept Mr. Aslan Jade Callenreese as your beloved husband?"

"Always ..." Eiji responds and takes the simple golden ring from Yue and now puts it on the same finger on which your engagement ring rests while a sweet smile appears on your lips.

"Mr. Callenreese, do you accept Mr. Eiji Okumura as your beloved husband?"

"Always," you say firmly, feeling that you have never said or written a word more beautiful and true than that. Your fingers put the golden ring on the place where there is a flower of brilliant jewels and Eiji smiles, he smiles because he knows that you are his, that he is yours and that both are the life and love of the other.

"By the power of the state of New York I declare you husbands in the eyes of the world," says the minister with a smile on his lips. “You can share a kiss now, Mr. and Mr. Callenreese-Okumura.”

Those words were not necessary, you think. You take Eiji's face in your hands and approach him to kiss him gently in the middle of a rain of flower petals that his friends and family throw around him. Everyone claps. Everyone cries now without caring about looking ridiculous. Couples hug and everyone feels part of that infinite whole that you and Eiji just created.

"I love you, husband ..." he whispers over your lips.

"I love you, Eiji Callenreese-Okumura ..." you answer by looking him in the eye.

Spring then blooms in your eyes, it shines in the smile of your lips and you know that that bloom will have no end. You are a garden now and feeling the owner of that certainty your lips come back to that mouth where your destiny is written and you taste again the sweetness of that eternity the two have just promised to each other.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> * This quotation belongs to Pablo Neruda: "They can cut all the flowers, but they cannot stop the spring."
> 
> 1\. The song with which Eiji walks to the altar is "Complete" by Girls Generation (SNSD). I made my own English translation.
> 
> 2\. What can I tell you, dear everyone? This is a very special chapter for me because I owed my two beautiful boys, Ash and Eiji, the end they deserve and that the original story denied us. Right now I am more feelings than a person, so I hope you liked this great piece of sweet things and lots of love. And really, I am very happy to write all this and that you share the story with me. I hope I have not disappointed you. There are still several more chapters left for this sweet rave so I hope you can read until the end :) Please, don´t be shy this time and let me now your thoughts about this chapter, that would mean the world for me :3


	59. From the article "Love, spring and eternity" published in Vogue magazine.

**From the article "Love, spring and eternity" published in Vogue magazine.**

**By Yut-Lung Lee**

No one, not even the two protagonists of the fairy tale that has kept New York busy for the last two weeks, could deny that I was the person responsible for all the magic of that wedding. I have received at least ten offers from different American celebrities in recent days to organize once again such a wonderful event as the now Mr. Callenreese-Okumura had for them in the Astor room of the New York Public Library.

Obviously, I have refused. What I did for Eiji and Aslan is a one-time event. The Dragon Lord of the Lee Clan cannot satisfy everyone's wishes. There were moments during the planning of this event when I had to stop to wonder why the hell I was putting so much effort in organizing a wedding that has already been inscribed on the list of the ten best receptions of the decade. The answer to that question is simple: it was for love. People usually do a lot of stupid things in the name of love.

I am not saying that all this has been stupid because those who attended the wedding ceremony of one of the most famous writers of recent years in the United States and his mate who is also an Olympic pole vaulting champion and professional photographer, we all agreed that we witnessed one of those rare moments in which love seems to be something real, more than the main ingredient of all the books that were surrounding us.

Aslan Jade Callenreese and Eiji Okumura seemed princes created by the imagination of the most romantic poets who have ever walked this world and what made them more beautiful was that both are real. The two wore a pair of custom-made dark suits, Italian silk obviously chosen by me. His rings, the two colorful jewels that shone on his fingers, were the perfect complement to the apparent simplicity of his outfits that, however, did not diminish the elegance and beauty of the two.

Both grooms looked superb, and perhaps what flashed in the middle of the room full of flowers in which they joined their lives without thinking of an end, was the glare of their eyes. I do not lie when I say that the united gaze of the two was something powerful, it was as if the birth of another universe was being made between their eyes.

When the two pronounced their vows, the same ones that we have already faithfully transcribed at the beginning of this article, no one could contain the tears, not even me. The words of the writer and the photography teacher were powerful, perfect in their honesty and warmth. Those of us who were there to witness it agreed that the promise made by Mr. Okumura-Callenreese was more than a promise. There are words that become caresses for the soul, words that take shape and remain etched with fire on the skin of those who listen and the words of Aslan and Eiji were of that kind. Through the words of Aslan and Eiji, I think we were all a little closer to eternity.

After the ceremony, the couple had a photo shoot around the Public Library, which is, as all their fans know, the place where the writer Callenreese has created his most important works, including his unforgettable debut novel "Banana fish." From the beginning, this place that has always contained no more than happy memories for the writer, was also destined to be the place where one of his greatest dreams would be forever portrayed in photographs that would preserve the memories of this day of the dust of oblivion.

Some of the photographs, the vast majority of them taken by the talented Japanese photographer Shunichi Ibe (mentor of Eiji Okumura, who also took several photographs of this collection), will be available on the magazine's website from the publication of this article. All these images show us the sublime beauty that the decorators in my care achieved with the presence of the thousands of flowers of different colors that we placed throughout the Astor Room.

That iconic hall of the New York Public Library became a spring garden for a few hours. The theme of the magic garden was a faithful replica of the feelings that united the two new husbands: flowers and perfumes everywhere, a colorful landscape that made the guests think that in this land where laughter and the promises of love abounded, the idea of a winter was impossible.

I have already received many messages that tell me that my decoration was the star of the party but in spite of myself and my own satisfaction, I must say that it was not that way: the star of the night was the moment in which the two new husbands had their first dance as newlyweds. I think I can never put into words the total beauty of that moment: above them, the starry sky projected on the ceiling of the room gave a perfect touch to the fantasy of that moment.

The two seemed to be floating in the middle of the dance floor lit by small silver lights. Since the minister had proclaimed them husbands in the eyes of others, neither seemed to be able to take off the eyes of the other. Although they walked hand in hand between the guest tables, thanking all of them for their presence, there was not a single moment in which their eyes were separated by more than two seconds.

In many cultures around the world, it is believed that the main connection of souls is the look. If I had doubts about this postulate, Mr. and Mr. Callenreese-Okumura just made it clear to me that everything is true: through their eyes, Aslan and Eiji were able to create an entire world.

Their dance was like that of the cherry branches that sway with the warm wind of spring, a slow dance that is full of grace for the eyes of those who look at them. It was also as if soft flower petals were sprouting from their steps, from their joined hands, from the still and serene smiles of their lips. Aslan and Eiji were like two proud flowers swaying in the wind that danced outside everything while the lyrics of the song that the two chose to dance made us sigh heavily. I had to take my husband's hand tightly. My heart was melting in the middle of my chest as I watched the couple, who rather than dance, seemed to be drawing circles in the living room. Because the circle is the symbol of that which has no beginning or end. The dance steps of the new husbands were another promise of an infinite who was feeding on music, flowers and sighs of love.

My eyes were wet again. It is a shame to confess it but it would be worse to hide it and besides, I have the defense of knowing that everyone gets cheesy at weddings. With greater reason if the person you look at dancing in the middle of a room is that boy who became your best friend and who moved away from you that loneliness to which you had been condemned since you were born. I was happy, I was proud of Eiji and I wanted him to be able to love and to be loved the way Aslan loves him.

That was the happy ending of all fairy tales, wasn't it? The two princes dancing close to each other, the music interwoven with the melody of their heartbeat. It is here that anyone would have put the iconic phrase of _"and they lived happily ever after"._ However, everyone in that room was sure of something: that was not the end that was a happy beginning for two souls who, before knowing the joy of love and company, had to overcome their demons and accept to leave behind their loneliness

The lyrics of her wedding song were also simple and beautiful at the same time. It was an ode to the promises the two had made in their marriage vows. The two danced promising to love each other, the string trio endorsed that song that accompanied the lovers in that moment of intimacy in which their souls were one and were far from everyone despite being in front of our eyes while with their eyes they said all those words that the song shouted in his name:

_I will love you, I will love you like the world._

_I will love you even if it has an end._

_I will love you, I will love you deeply._

_I will love you as I have to love._

_I will love you, I will love you as I can._

_I will love you even if it is not peace._

_I will love you, I will love you what is left._

_I will love you when I finish loving._

_I will love you, I will love you if I am dead._

_I'll love you the next day too._

_I will love you, I will love you as I feel._

_I will love you with goodbye, with never._

_I will love you, I will love you by the wind._

_I will love you as the only being._

_I will love you until the end of time._

_I will love you and then I will love you again..._

_I will love you with goodbye, with never._ The promise of a love that will never fear the finitude of our human life. That was the promise of loving each other without fear, without thinking about the end of the trip and to simply enjoy the road. That was what the two promised in silence. There was no room for more words between the two because their eyes had already said everything.

There are times when a sublime silence is all that two lovers need. Ash and Eiji are already able to communicate without too many words. We all applaud at that moment. I had to wipe my tears once more and the two of them, oblivious to all the noise from outside, kept turning even though the song had ended long ago. Nobody had the heart to separate them so we smiled and let them dance a little more. We only returned them to the real world when it was time to cut the huge white cake topped with flowers that was my design too and it was fun to notice that in the eyes of the two there was also a quiet urgency, that little flame that urges the lovers looking for a lonely and dark space in which they can express with the body what words will never be able to express.

I laughed a little at them. I laughed at the urgency in Eiji's voice when he asked me if the hotel room in which the two would spend their wedding night was far from the Library. My best friend was in a hurry.

Once the cake rite was completed and not to make them wait any longer, I made a memorable speech that went more or less like this:

"I want us to make a toast for the happiness of two human beings who have known how to make their scars the greatest strength of both of them. They are who they are today, not because of the damage that the world did to them, but precisely because despite that damage they could find love within them. I want to toast two brave men who will continue to face everything holding hands. I want to toast my best friend, for this man that I am proud of today. Be very happy, Eiji, be very happy because Aslan is an idiot and he is never going to deserve you and yet, I'm willing to let you make him happy. I will let him do that because I know he makes you happier than anyone in the universe. I hope you know how lucky you are, Aslan, I hope you know that you have a huge responsibility now: you have to make every day in Eiji's life something wonderful because if you don't do it, idiot, now I am going to kill you. No, Eiji honey, don't look at me like that. I know your Aslan is not going to fail you but the threats are not over. I´m wishing you your happiness, Aslan and Eiji, I toast for your eternal love and know that you always have my support and protection. Raise your glasses for Mr. and Mr. Callenreese-Okumura.”

“For Mr. Callenreese Okumura!” they all yelled.

Was it a memorable speech? Of course it was! Shorter Wong, the other best man said a string of idiocy that makes no sense to transcribe here but in essence it was the same: desires for eternal happiness and remembrances of darkness that in Ash became light when he met Eiji.

After that, our new husbands fled the room not before making sure to throw their bouquets of flowers that mysteriously fell into the hands of Miss Kaori Okumura who looked gorgeous in her soft blue dress and who only smiled at her brother with a hint of fun that suddenly reminded me that I still have an Okumura to worry about. No doubt I must ensure that Kaori does not marry any stupid person in the same way that his older brother did.

In conclusion, this wedding was beautiful as the love of the two men who joined their path for life. In these moments, the two must be enjoying their honeymoon in Izumo, the birthplace of Eiji. I am sure they should be happy and wrapped in the honey of love and passion surrounded by cherry blossoms that are a delight for the eyes at this time of year. It is spring. There is no better time for romance than spring, at the same time that flowers do, passion must also be born. Just remembering the look in Eiji's and Aslan's eyes after their first dance, I'm sure there really must be passion in them now. Gross! Nevertheless, I hope they are enjoying it because after all, there is no expression of love in this world that is not a miracle. When two souls come together, it must be celebrated. We must continue to celebrate that love exists and I hope you soon find yours, dear reader.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Their wedding song is called "Te amaré" ( I will love you) by Silvio Rodriguez. It is a beautiful song that´s originally sung in Spanish. I made my own English translation for it.


	60. With the spring moon as their witness.

**With the spring moon as their witness.**

 

The silence is almost electric.

Aslan Jade Callenreese´s eyes are full of endless different emotions: anxiety, passion, burning, all wrapped up afterwards with the presence of a love that borders on the most complete adoration anyone has ever felt.

His green eyes do not detach from the body of the other man who smiles a few inches from him with emotion. This is something in his eyes that is new and also, comforting and known. His dark eyes shine with the same intensity with which the moon beams enter through the window. The moonlight is reflected in his smile and in the bare skin of his belly.

The two have entered the magical gloom of that room for some time. It was not necessary to turn on the light because his senses are sharp, expectant, somewhat agitated by the proximity of the other. Aslan could not repress himself and had lifted Eiji in his arms to pass him through the threshold of that door that, although it would not be his home forever, it would be the first nest in which the two would experience the emotion of a first encounter like that.

Ash's hands shake without him being able to avoid it. Eiji's skin is like one of his favorite books already, a beloved book that is known with just the touch, with the aroma. Ash thinks he could recognize Eiji's skin even if his eyes stopped seeing. He could meet Eiji only by his perfume or by the way in which a cheerful and pleased sound comes out of his lips when Ash's hands begin to settle on the moonlight that caresses Eiji as well.

That night is special, it is different. The aroma of new life enters through the window and sneaks around them. Eiji's arms tangle in Ash's waist as he tries to lure himself with a hint of despair that paints a pleased smile on the writer's lips. In Eiji's arms, the fact of being wanted with intensity has never been a problem for Ash. In Eiji's arms, what they will do next has ceased to be a trauma and has become the experience of thousands of pleasurable sensations that he did not know a man could feel.

That night is a celebration, Eiji and Ash know it and maybe it is that certainty that makes, after a smile of mutual agreement appear in their mouths, the lips of the two crash calmly and open slowly. Although there is passion in their kisses, there is no hurry. Because although their hands slide over each other’s skin as if it were the last night of their lives, in reality they both know that it is the first of many. The first in which they can call each other’s husband. The first in which perhaps, there is no ghost around each kiss, each caress.

Ash knows that there is no place for the past that night, he doesn't even think about it at that moment. In his mind there is only Eiji, under his hands is only Eiji's skin and around him that fresh and masculine perfume that emanates from the body of his beloved and that now blends with his.

A happy sigh that embarrasses him a bit escapes Eiji's lips when he feels Ash's hands slip under the delicate white silk of his shirt. Ash's hands are warm and full of moonlight. Although some nights in New York are still cold, in that presidential suite the temperature of the skins of the two seems to indicate that the flowers will be born at any time and Eiji cannot help wondering if that anxiety that fills every inch of his skin with every caress Ash provides him, it's the same as cherry blossoms feel before blooming with majesty every spring.

The Japanese's man cheeks are flushed and his lips look for his husband's mouth that until a few seconds ago kissed his neck softly, sucking his skin as if Ash were eating an especially sweet and appetizing candy and Eiji lets his hands slide down Ash's soft skin too. He wants to touch everything. He wants to learn each of the places of that body by heart. A single night may not be possible but he will try. Of course he will try.

And Ash also wants to touch him, caress him. Of course, among them they had experienced that but not as intensely as now, not without feeling that something burns between their bodies that their skins are thirsty of the other. Those caresses have only one destiny and that neither can wait any longer.

Because while Eiji's hands caress Ash with the rhythm of a pianist who plays his favorite piece, the green-eyed boy wonders why the two delayed that moment so much and it is said that there may not be a logical answer to that question . Eiji never complained about how hard the process was. Eiji never claimed Ash for every night of recoil. Eiji always understood that even if Ash didn't want it, there would always be some horrible memory that would make his beloved think about all those attacks he had suffered as a child.

However, on this night full of magic, Ash does not think of any of that because there is something in his heart and in his whole body that tells him that he is ready because he and Eiji are adults, both have discovered each other to grope, gently and sweetly and above all, the two trust each other to such an extent that the union of the two, that union that began on a summer day, gradually becomes that kind of bond that goes beyond the body, that transcends the soul making them feel that soon the two will be able to understand the idea of immortality as long as Aslan's fingers and his hands continue to paint words and poems on Eiji's skin.

That is why Aslan strips Eiji calmly, he takes his time. It is as if the blond thinks that Eiji is a special book with which his hands and his lips that burn on the skin of the Japanese man, must be careful. Because he knows from the experience of an artist who has written successful and praised books throughout the world that Eiji is a masterpiece. Ash knows that he must read his beloved without hurrying, feeling yes, the pressing fire of passion, of that thirst that is born of the reader when he wants to know what will happen later, but also reading it with reserve, taking his time to reach the climax, reading again and again his favorite phrases, whispering in the ear of his love secrets that no one but Eiji will be able to hear.

Eiji's clothes fall to the floor and with the calm of who knows that there is nothing to fear when it comes to surrendering to someone loved, the fingers of the young Japanese undress Ash as well and feeling his bare and warm skin glued to that of his now husband, Eiji wonders how it was that she had been able to resist so many days without having the slightest idea about what it was like to feel that skin that now seems to open before his hands like spring flowers would feel when she felt the first rays of sun about them. Under Eiji's hands, there is a blooming garden.

Aslan's lips look for Eiji's again, and young Callenreese gets rid of his pants at once and they both fall on the huge bed in the room that is covered with flower petals. The two fall on the mattress laughing and kissing, losing each other in each other's arms, finding themselves thousands of times in the midst of the sighs of love that flow from their lips, feeling that the center of their body burns, that the skin of their limbs, sensitive and warm, tense when rubbing with the hardness of the other.

And that shared nudity, that nudity that is not only in the body but also in the soul makes Eiji bite Ash's lips without worrying about looking ambitious, maybe he is, maybe the Japanese man wants Ash to be his at that moment and nobody else´s. Yes, Eiji knows that it is foolish of his to need to know that something more than our own body belongs to us, but he cannot avoid it.

He wants Aslan Jade Callenreese to touch him the way he does now for a lifetime; He wants Aslan's fingers to cling to his erection and slowly stroke it making him see stars in the middle of that kiss that has suddenly filled with the salty and rusty taste of blood.

Yes, Eiji is selfish when it comes to those hands, when it comes to those kisses that keep reading, they keep writing because Ash knows that the chapter that the two have started writing today will not be a single chapter. He knows in their lives are missing still many nights like that, many nights of madness, of happiness, nights of passion that will begin with any pretext, with the inevitable desire to belong to the other.

Eiji smiles without being able to avoid it while Aslan turns around on the mattress, resting the head of the raven on one of the pillows and when his eyes rest on him, Eiji feels that Ash's beauty dazzles him because Aslan is beautiful, he is perfect.

Ash's emerald eyes stay fixed on his, he looks at Eiji as if he looks at a miracle, as if Eiji's black eyes were able to perform miracles, alleviate hunger, restore the lives of those who have died, make the blind see, make a man feel immortal by loving him the way the Ash is able to love him.

Because he loves Eiji, of course he loves him and Eiji can read that love that burns in his eyes and discovers that the story that Ash's pupils tell is his favorite story of all the writer has created, so Eiji caresses his cheeks and legs hug at the waist of Aslan who feels excited to notice the blush on the cheeks of the Japanese and to feel that his fingers caress his face, moving slowly to his lips. And he starts kissing Eiji's fingers as he lets his erection rub on his beloved's belly and Eiji feels that movement makes him tremble. Aslan sucks his lover's fingers making him gasp, makes him groan and although it is a strange sound to him, Eiji is not ashamed of that sound because Aslan smiles ecstatically when he hears it.

"I love you, Eiji ..." Ash says when his lips peel off the other boy's and Eiji smiles in such a beautiful way that Ash feels like crying and the blond feels he owns the world by saying those words to that man who is telling him with the look that he would die for him if Ash asks.

"I love you too ..." Eiji says and the dark-haired man smiles because he knows that he will be able to find those words in the story told by his husband's body a thousand times.

"I think I've loved you without knowing it since you appeared in the middle of the garden of the Faculty of Fine Arts and I started talking to my best friend about you ..."

 "I love you from the first word I read for the first time in one of your books, my Aslan," Eiji says with the sweetness of the one who says I love you for the first time knowing that love is more than reciprocated. “You do not know how much I love you...”

"Yes, I know ..." Ash replies, smiling in the midst of his happiness. “Yes I know, my love, I know...”

The words of the two are lost in the emptiness of the room as Ash's lips slide back from Eiji's lips to his neck, slowly traveling north. Ash kisses him, and Eiji lets his body feel those kisses without any inhibition, he is not ashamed that Ash does that because he is kissing the deepest part of his being.

Aslan is the dawn that announces a new world, Eiji thinks. Ash is like sun and Eiji is a spring flower that will open before that light, that light that will penetrate it and give it life, warmth, color.

A gasp shouts out of the black-haired lips when Ash's lips relieve his fingers in the task of stroking his cock which seems to have a life of his own and feels hot and hard while the writer's lips slide down that skin. Eiji tries to close his eyes for a moment but something prevents him and that something is the desire to see Ash kissing that part of his body that way. Eiji doesn't want to miss the wonderful vision of having Aslan Jade Callenreese between his legs, his mouth going up and down his penis, Ash's saliva spilling over the tense skin of his testicles.

That is a beautiful, innocent and perverse image, but at the same time the living image of passion, the vivid image of human nature reminding Eiji that through the union of bodies is that men can feel at least for a moment that are more than an individual being, that are more than two, that are more, much more than a material condemned to die one day.

Because at the beginning of the world there was only love and desire, and love and desire is what is in Ash's eyes who stares at him while his lips continue to devour him and the fingers of his left hand begin to explore the entrance of the Eiji with calm, with that studied and sensual calm that Ash uses when touching hi, because even a caress as intimate as that is carried out with exquisite care that makes Eiji want to close his eyes when he feels that those fingers sink into him as if looking for a path , as if Ash's fingers sought to read now the way they should get into it.

And for a moment the feelings that invade Eiji are too many. The man knows that if Ash continues to touch him the way he does, Eiji will let go but no, not yet. Eiji dies for feeling Ash inside him, that's what he wants. Eiji wants Ash to sink into him and kiss him while he moves and attacks him without calm, but with the naked desire to make him his own. And Eiji wants to be his, wants to belong to his husband forever. He knows that love is not about property, but he wants Ash to know that he can have him, that he will have him forever, and that Eiji hopes to have him too.

That's why Eiji gets out of bed and without thinking about it, takes Aslan's face in his hands and kisses him violently feeling some of his own taste on his lips something that causes his skin to turn on heat and passion because he wants him inside, he needs Ash to be inside him. Eiji needs to fly with him in a new sky and explode. Eiji needs Aslan to take him back to the stars in the same way they have gone to the vastness of the sky, perhaps, since the first kiss they both shared.

Ash tangles his hands in Eiji's long, soft black hair, stirs it, clings to him tightly, perfectly understanding what his husband wants, and that is something he can give Eiji because what Eiji wants is the same as he craves and the black-haired man lets his nails dig into his back and Ash groans without inhibition because he feels he is ready, he feels he will burst if he contains only one more minute.

So after separating from Eiji simply to be able to take the necessary precautions and reach the lubricant tube, Aslan accommodates his husband on the bed, Eiji's back is resting on a pillow, his legs open welcoming him, asking him to finally make real  what he had only dared to dream. The blonde sighs at the sight of his beloved, touching himself without being able to avoid it, staring into his eyes, telling him without words that he must end that agonizing torture that represents the fact of being away from his skin.

Aslan smiles because he knows he is desired but not only to be damaged. Aslan smiles because Eiji wants him, because Eiji could have chosen any other guy and yet he decided to love him patiently, without asking him for anything that is happening that magical night before, in those dark days when something like what he does now would not have been possible for Ash.

Not until the lynx's wounds healed completely, not until Ash decided to surrender to him without fear of harming him. And Eiji is so beautiful now that nothing in the world could further delay that delivery. Ash thinks that his lover's flushed cheeks and swollen lips are an ode to beauty that no artist can ever match. Aslan thinks that Eiji is a work of art and he wants to become spring with the beloved of his heart.

That is why now the New York lynx approaches Eiji again and prepares his entrance calmly and Eiji feels that Ash may well save the preambles but at the same time, there is so much love in his look that the Japanese knows he has to be patient too. Aslan will come to him anyway; he will arrive to Eiji because that was his destiny, perhaps, from the beginning of his life: to reach him, to reach him to make him happy and never to separate his paths.

So Eiji tries to relax although the pressure of Aslan's fingers inside him is delicious but also insufficient and Eiji bites his lips trying not to beg the emerald-eyed man to get into it once and for all.

It is at that moment when Ash smiles and decides that it is time that he himself cannot contain for another second. So the blond gets into Eiji calmly, slowly, letting the entrance of his beloved get used to the invasion, being careful not to hurt him, sinking into him with the same grace and the same care with which he has created all His novels

Eiji closes his eyes, tries to breathe deeply so he can get used to the pain that soon ceases to be such a thing and transmutes back into a delicious friction that would be better if Ash began to move. And it is at that moment that Ash leans into Eiji's face and the black haired man reaches his lips as he begins to ram him and feels that all the pleasure in the world is concentrated inside him, that every lunge of Aslan reaches deeper inside, that Aslan's lips kissing him in a disorderly manner are the perfect pretext to write a thousand love stories and Eiji knows that Ash will write them all so that he can read them on his body and his again and again.

"My Eiji, my husband, my love ..." says Ash in a voice broken with pleasure, sweat runs down his face and Eiji kisses his name on the lips of his beloved.

"Oh Aslan!" Says the dark-haired man in the midst of a groan of pure pleasure. “My Aslan.”

And the two repeat the name of the other in the middle of that crazy concert of sighs, whispers, grunts and screams of pleasure that escape from their lips. It is as if the name of the other was a spell made in the dim light of the street lights, and the glare of that full and proud spring moon. It is as if Eiji's name, together with Ash's, was a spell capable of transporting them to another dimension.

Because the two feel that they fly once more, they fly beyond the planet earth, they fly to that place from which all the stories are born and they are flying in the infinite. And Aslan moves faster inside Eiji and Eiji clings to his lips again because the explosion of pleasure is near, very close and Ash's flushed cheeks as well as the rhythm of his thumps that are now desperate and not very careful continue to sink in Eiji and the dark-haired man suspects that liberation will be an outburst and that although the desire will have eased a little, in a matter of seconds he will want to feel again what only Aslan is able to make him feel.

Because Aslan loves him. Because Eiji loves Aslan beyond himself. Because they really feel that the two are making love, as if the two were a couple of mischievous words that have suddenly discovered that the only way to create true love is through the body, hands and lips of the one who loves him with the strength of the spring which is the one who makes the world reborn with his breath.

It is in the midst of those thoughts when Eiji feels that Ash screams with pleasure and that expression that is the sound image of a huge orgasm sneaks into the Eiji´s ears like an aphrodisiac that leads him to spill and makes him scream also because what Ash made him feel it was intense, too intense and inexplicable. Aslan kisses him once more, he falls on top of his beloved's chest and Eiji clings to his body as well. Eiji kisses her lips gently, amid the tremors of her skin. Eiji pronounces his husband's name a thousand times.

And Ash tells him that he loves him one more time, he tells him that he loves him every time the lips of the two take off to take a breath because Ash really wants the raven to feel secure in his love.

And Eiji wants Ash to know that this love is mutual, that it always will be and that what they just did is nothing more than a confirmation of that feeling of enormous magnitudes that seems to fill them completely and that heats them in body and soul. Both of them smile at each other with that hint of mischief that the gods must have had after creating the universe.

And then Ash stops kissing Eiji just for a moment, just a moment when his green eyes are lost on the face of the Japanese trying to guess what his beloved is thinking, if Eiji, like him, thinks that happiness is possible for all humans. Ash wonders if Eiji, like him, feels that the sight of his face flushed and his messy black hair that falls like rain on the white sheets is something so fucking beautiful that surely that will be the image that will accompany him to eternity if is that in eternity there is also space for love and for life.

"You are so beautiful, Eiji ..." says Ash making the other man smile, making Eiji hide his face in his bare chest and hug him tightly because Ash is the only person he could truly believe he is beautiful.

"You make me like that ..." Eiji says. “I am beautiful in your eyes, Ash.”

 "No, no, my love ..." he says, separating himself from his beloved just to stare at him, his fingers outlining Eiji's chin and his lips. “You're beautiful because that's how you are, everyone can see it but do you know something?”

"What?" Says Eiji delighted by the way Ash is able to say such beautiful things as he has said so far.

"Only I can see you like that, only I know how beautiful you are in my arms," says Ash and kisses him gently again as if that kiss was a sacred seal that will not let Eiji forget his words.

"I don't want anyone else to see me like that, I don't want anyone else to see you like this," Eiji says without being able to avoid sounding like a possessive shit but doesn't really care. “Ash, I know that we are already married and that in fact this is something I would have to be sure because you are my husband, but can you be just for me? Will you let me be alone with you every day of my life?”

"Always ..." says Ash rolling in bed with Eiji in his arms, placing his husband's body now on top of his. “I am yours forever is it okay?”

Eiji smiles and nods, and kisses him playfully knowing he won't want to separate from him all night but that's fine. There´s no hurry for them.

The moon continues to shine outside announcing to the world the arrival of the nights without cold but to Eiji and Ash the change of the seasons is something that does not worry them at all at that moment. So they just kiss again wishing that night never ends, maybe they shouldn't leave that room until next year. And Aslan continues to kiss his beloved with the firm conviction that after having loved himself that way for the first time, he can make the gloom under which their bodies have come together want to last for all eternity.

 


	61. A conversation heard by cherry blossoms.

**_A conversation heard by cherry blossoms._ **

**_A= ASH_ **

**_E= EIJI_ **

_A: Did you always dream of a moment like this, Eiji?_

_E: A moment like that?_

_A: A moment where you felt that you don't need anything more than to keep walking in the middle of all the flowers of the universe._

_E: I think I never thought there really was a moment like this, Ash._

_A: Are you happy?_

_E: I am much more than happy, maybe I am happier than any human could have asked. You always make me happy. I think I learned the meaning of happiness by your side._

_A: Eiji…_

_E: You are adorable when you blush, my Aslan._

_A: You don't do it anymore..._

_E: Of course! I can't help it when you touch me and you make me…_

_A: When I do that thing that drives you crazy? I really believe that I have improved a lot in the fine art of loving you, don't you think? I am an expert in Eiji Okumura-Callenreese now._

_E: Don't say it out loud!_

_A: Why not? I don't want to shut up what I feel, I never want to do it anymore._

_E: Well, I don't want you to shut it up but I'm a little shy._

_A: You're not, not anymore._

_E: Ash!_

_A: I always want to kiss you when you make that annoyed face, husband._

_E: I'm not going to kiss you if you keep mentioning those things._

_A: You know you are lying, you love my kisses._

_E: Yes I know. I always want to kiss you._

_A: Shorter says it's a shame that we haven't passed the honeymoon phase since we met._

_E: It's the truth, although sometimes you really make me angry, Ash._

_A: Do I?_

_E: Yes, when you buy mustard for example._

_A: But I let you prepare natto even though our department stinks for a month._

_E: Natto is delicious, aren't you going to give it a try even if we're in Japan now?_

_A:  Of course not! Natto is a horror that I will never understand but if you like it, what can I do? If you enjoy it, then it's fine._

_E: You are the best husband in the world, do you know that?_

_A: No, that's you, Eiji._

_E: Aslan..._

_A: Oh, there it is! My favorite blush!_

_E: I'm not blushing! But stop bothering me and better answer me, Ash ... are you happy?_

_A: I am happy since I know you and now that I can call you my husband, there is no day when I do not feel that all the happiness in the universe is mine..._

_E: And your wounds, don't they hurt anymore?_

_A: Not right now, they don't hurt anymore. When I get lost with you I even doubt that I have  ever had wounds and pain. I think a lot of my pain has healed at last. However, Eiji, I know that one day I will wake up screaming again because there are too horrible things inside me. I did horrible things that will always remain inside me, I can't help it._

_E: But I'll be there, I'll always be there and I´ll hold you until you scream no more and until the past fades once more._

_A: I know, you promised me so on our wedding day._

_E: Can you believe our wedding was two weeks ago?"_

_A: Time flies by quickly…_

_E: I want to have another wedding, I think I was too happy on that day, didn't you?_

_A: Yes, I think I could even tolerate the idea of Yut-Lung organizing another wedding for both of us._

_E: Yue loves you know._

_A: I will allow myself to doubt it for another hundred years._

_E: Come on Ash, he really was happy for both of us, Yue organized a perfect ceremony for you and me. I'm dying because Mr. Ibe already sent us the photo album. Yue says it was beautiful. Oh Ash! You looked beautiful!_

_A: And you ... I really wanted to cry when I looked at you. I had never seen anything so beautiful in my life, I could hardly believe that of all the men in the world it would be I who would link their life to yours. Although, well, maybe there is something more beautiful now._

_E: What thing?_

_A: You Eiji, you smiling like that in the middle of all these flowers._

_E: Do you like spring in Japan?_

_A: It's the most beautiful of how many I've seen, but it's not the cherry or Izumo's charm, it's you._

_E: I would like to give you all this spring, Ash._

_A: You give it to me every day, Eiji._

_E: Why do you always tell me such beautiful things?_

_A: Because you are my muse._

_E: Are you writing about me now?_

_A: About both of us, Eiji, I write about you and me._

_E: Really?_

_A: Yes, and stop smiling because I'm really going to have to kiss you here and now in the middle of all these flowers._

_E: I'm going to be part of your books, Ash, I can't stop smiling, I can't. I want to read the book! I want to read our story one more time._

_A: But you already know it all, my love. Come, there are flower petals in your hair, I will remove them._

_E: I want to read our story through your eyes, Ash._

_A: Then never stop looking at me and that's it, there you can see the story of both of us._

_E: But I want to read a new book from my favorite writer!_

_A: Maybe it´ll be ready for next winter._

_E: Will it?_

_A: Yes, really. And if you keep smiling like that maybe I will finish it sooner._

_E: It will be like our first child!_

_A: Children?_

_E: Well, I didn't mean that you and I ... that ... well ..._

_A: Let's have a huge family, I always wanted to have one. Although we may have to wait a bit, you know, Dr. Jessica says that a marriage must first be based on the full enjoyment of your life partner._

_E: Do you really want to start a family with me?_

_A: I already have it, Eiji, we would only make it bigger. If we adopt a girl, I'm sure Kaori, Yue and Shorter are going to become the most annoying uncle-aunt trio you can imagine. I've always dreamed of being a father, you know? To be able to give love to a girl whom they have abandoned like Griffin or like me._

_E: And we'll name her Ashley, Ashley Mirai in the name of the future._

_A: How beautiful! I think you've been thinking about this idea a lot._

_E: The truth is, I just thought about it now._

_A: Always so witty, my Eiji._

_E: We're going to be happy forever, Aslan, even if the world doesn't give us permission. We must fulfill all the dreams that we have in our hearts._

_A: That's what I'm doing right now. Seriously, Eiji, you and this spring are all the dreams I want to fulfill now._

_E: I love you, Ash._

_A: I love you, Eiji._

_E: Do you want to go to the sea?_

_A: No, let's look at the flowers a little more. I want to remember them forever. I don't want to miss them yet. Our honeymoon will be something we will never forget._

_E: We're not going to forget anything because we will both be here next spring. And also the next one._

_A: I know, but this is the first._

_E: The first of many._

_A: Forever, Eiji._

_E: Forever, Ash._


	62. Subject: Thank you.

**To: drjrandy@gmail.com**

**From: ashlynx@gmail.com**

**Subject: Thank you.**

 

Jessica:

I wanted to tell you everything I will write next from the day we said goodbye but I'm afraid we used every minute of my last session with you on me. I'm not complaining, I really have to thank you a million things and one of them is the infinite patience you had with me throughout this process that lasted more than two years. I know you always told me that everything you did for me is only part of your job but I need you to know that it was really more for me than that: you know how to listen, you know how to help people really heal.

I don't know how difficult it must be to listen at all times to the hundreds of hells with which your patients come to you. Undoubtedly, your work is difficult but when you feel that you cannot do more, I want you to think about what I will tell you next: you make huge changes in small worlds, in worlds full of darkness like mine. You are a doctor of the soul and I thank you for showing me the way to heal mine. You change the world with every wound you manage to close, the world is really different because of what you do every day in your work.

If I am a new man now, I owe it to you. If I am able to share my life with a man I love with all my heart right now, it is thanks to you. Eiji gave me the strength to go ahead with my treatment and you didn't let me give up allowing me to do things at my own pace, without pressing me, just by accompanying me.

My Eiji once told me that I was like a broken ceramic vessel to which a craftsman was healing, teaching him to show his wounds with pride, those wounds that would be covered with gold. You were that craftswoman in my life, Jess, and I hope that leaving the titles aside will not bother you now, but since you and Max are together I feel that you are part of my real family. I know you will be very happy by his side, Max is one of the first good men I met. He took care of me as if I were a son to him from the first moment he saw me and that's why I know that Max will be an excellent father for Michael. I cannot believe that your son has already turned one year, it seems that it was only yesterday that I had him in my arms being a little baby.

I'm going to miss you, you know? But Eiji is right to say that New York will always have too many painful memories in each street. You know that I am not running away from all that but I do want to start a new life somewhere else, in that place where Eiji and I will create our own nest. Tomorrow he and I will fly to Japan, we have bought a huge house in Izumo, by the sea and with a huge garden that will be full of cherry blossoms in spring. My husband and I will stay away from teaching for a while and we will make other dreams come true.

Eiji wants to start a new career as a sports photographer next to Mr. Ibe and I, well, I would like to dedicate myself to writing the novel that will undoubtedly be remembered by the world as my best.

I think I can only be a writer right now, a writer who thanks every minute of his life on earth because he has a peaceful and wonderful life that is full of love. I also want to dedicate myself to love Eiji without worrying about anything, I believe that loving him is a new adventure with each passing day and after a grace period I may once again become a university professor. I do not know. I can do what I want and this is the freedom I always dreamed of. There is a complete life in front of me that waits for me and I will live it next to the man I love and that is why I cannot be happier when thinking about my future.

By the way, I also thank you for the recommendation letter you wrote for the adoption commission. I know that the process that Eiji and I started last week will be arduous and hard but I'm not afraid to have started it. It doesn't matter if I have to wait a year, two or even more. I will not give up until I can have a little girl in my arms, a girl who will be the daughter of my heart and Eiji's heart who is not afraid of living this adventure by my side either.

He is happy with the idea of being a father and judging by everyone's reaction at the last dinner we had with our family, that family that Eiji and I were building throughout our lives with people who do not share their blood with us. Shorter was crying hugging his Cain's body after hearing the news, while Nadia and Kaori discussed the best feeding methods for children and all the clothes they would both buy for the new member of our family.

Well, his majesty Yut-Lung must have been inspired by the news because he and Sing went with Eiji and me to the child care offices two weeks later. It would not surprise me at all that the Dragon Lord of the Clan Lee takes a little less time than Eiji and I to be a father but hey, this is no longer a competition. I know that the boy or girl that he and Sing adopt will be lucky. Although much of his life, Yue tried to protect his heart with coldness and contempt, he is actually a soft guy who has a heart full of love to give full hands. I think he even loves me a little and you know something? I have also grow fond of him but I will not accept it before anyone but you.

I feel ready to be a good father, Jessica. I know that fatherhood is not learned and that I will not be able to solve everything by looking up it in a book as I have always done, but I do not care. If Eiji is by my side, I will learn with him and I know that I will not let anyone hurt my little girl. I will protect her with all my love. I am going to teach her that although the world is a fearsome, dark and unfair place, there are so many things worth living. It is worth living to see his father smile, for example. It´s worth living to be surrounded by the arms of someone as beautiful as Eiji Okumura. I'm going to read Ashley Mirai all the stories that made me dream as a child. I will teach her to love art, I will teach her not to be afraid. I will teach her that love exists and that from the coldest winters the brightest springs are also born.

I dream about that, every day. I dream of having her in my arms. I know that I must be patient and that I may have to face endless frustrations but I will not give up. This is a dream that I will not leave unfulfilled, so I will keep you and Max aware of any updates. And I know it's silly to say so, but you and Max will be like Ashley's grandparents. You know that Eiji's parents still don't want to talk to him. I really want to talk to them, tell them they are idiots for neglecting the most beautiful and gentle man in the universe. Maybe I can make that change someday. I am going to think about it seriously and create a strategy because although Eiji says it does not affect him, I know that the fact that his parents have put him aside will always hurt him.

I hate that something hurts him. I hate that something like that hurts him so without a doubt, I will do something to remedy it and if I can't do it, then I will love Eiji until he can forget all the wounds of his heart. That is what I promised him on our wedding day and I will not fail to keep my promises for a single day.

Anyway, Jess, I guess we'll keep in touch. Tell old Max that my new life does not exclude him or you from it, we will only be a few kilometers away but distance is only a matter of space. We can talk and meet from time to time. Eiji and I will be happy to have you in Japan the day you want to visit us. Also remember that my husband and I will go to New York from time to time because of the adoption process so this is not goodbye. It never will be. Eiji and I hate that word and we both know that we will never say goodbye to the people we really love.

I wish you the best, Dr. Randy. Keep changing lives, keep relieving darkness. I will always thank you for everything you did for me and I know that in the same way that you do with the lives of your patients, you will also make your life a work of art. I know it's unprofessional to say it but I deeply appreciate you. Be very happy. I already had a very long conversation with Max about what a woman like you deserves to have in her life and believe me, he will not give you less. Max is a fool but he always fights for what he loves and delivers all of himself so I know that both of you and little Michael will be fine. I send the warmest of hugs to you three.

 

With love, Ash.


	63. Subject: love attack.

**From: okumura.eiji@gmail.com**

**To: itsyutlunglee-bitch@gmail.com**

**Subject: Love attack.**

Yue, I think I'm going to die out of love. Don't stop me, will you? I feel so completely happy that my heart does not fit in my chest. I do not think it is legal to feel this kind of happiness and yet, here I am, trying to stay standing while I look at the two people I love most in the universe being them, being the most beautiful thing I will ever look at.

The air of spring is here again. The cherry blossoms sway peacefully around them: my beloved, with her blond hair fluttering in the wind and the little girl who laughs peacefully in his arms as he points to the clouds that slide in a blue sky that seems unreal, too clear and too clean. Ash tells stories written in the clouds to our daughter and Ashley listens to him with adoration.

Can you believe that our little girl has been with us for a year now? Can you believe that my Ashley has grown so much to the point of being now sitting on the grass while Ash laughs with her and I am here, watching them from afar trying to keep my heart in a solid state? I listen to Ashley's laughter and I feel powerful, invincible. I watch as my little girl tries to catch in her hands the blooming petals that descend on her and on her father's green eyes and Yue, I can't understand how I became this being so full of love.

Ashley's hair, of an even darker blond than Ash's, falls on her back and I am even able to see how the brightness of her green eyes competes with the spring sun. Ashley calls Ash with that soft and cheerful twitter that we both want to become a dad soon, but that right now is nothing but a lot of sweet sounds without a concrete meaning. Ash says that Ashley will speak soon because my beloved and I talk to her normally, we talk to her about everything and she seems to understand us perfectly. His green eyes stay still on my face or Ash's when we both tell him a bedtime story or when I can't do anything other than sing the lullabies that Kaori and my mother used to sing for me.

By the way, Okumura grandparents showed up at our house a month ago. It was uncomfortable, painful and then, the three of us ended up crying. I cried because I never thought that my parents would come close to me, I cried because I think a part of me had been waiting for this reunion forever. I know that my parents and I still have a long way to go if we want our relationship to work but it was nice to see how mom and dad couldn't resist Ashley's charm.

The Grandparents love their granddaughter with all their soul, they come to visit her religiously every Sunday and I think my father is delighted to discover that his son-in-law is a wonderful writer. Seriously Yue, I think my father was a fan of Ash's books before me. My mother, on the other hand, insists on repairing her absence in my life and in all the special moments we missed over the years, teaching me to cook all her traditional dishes to such an extent, that Ash has told me if this continues we both will become an obese and happy marriage by the end of this year.

Do you know something? I think my Aslan had everything to do with this change of attitude of my parents towards me and towards the life that I decided to build by his side but I don't want to ask him. He keeps trying to protect me as usual, he makes my life a perpetual spring and I thank him every day.

 

In short, Yue, my family is fine, how are you? I feel like years have passed since we last spoke even though you, Sing and your little Wang were here with us less than three weeks ago.

Had I told you before that paternity suits you wonderfully? You are the most affectionate father a child could wish for although it is true that you must set certain limits for your son, Yue, I tell you as your best friend. Although Wang-Lung Lee will grow up to become the next Dragon Lord of your family (I seriously still can't believe you gave him a name that literally means "worthy of a king"), you must educate him well. Yes, yes, I know you will tell me that your son will own half of China, but come on, I don't want my Ashley to think that Uncle Yue will always be here to always pamper her in the same way he does with the cousin Wang

By the way, Ashley misses you, you know? The other time, while you were appearing on that talk show after your appearance in the US chamber of commerce, Ashley began to watch television and ended up crying when she realized that her beautiful uncle Yue was not really close to her. Ash frowned and said it couldn't be possible that even his daughter was delighted with your existence. Don't listen to him, you know he says it with love, although you and he would do well to stop competing for Ashley's attention. She is just a baby, Yue, and you know that she will always love you even though among both of us, I think that Dad Aslan will always be her favorite.

Since the adoption process was over and we were finally able to bring Ashley to Japan with us, Ash has done nothing but take care of her and love her with all her being. I think there will always be a part of Ash that is able to love in this way, without conditions, beyond himself. My Aslan loves our daughter with that love that springs from what he never had, you know? I think there are people who are able to deliver precisely what the world never gave them and Ash must be the best father in the universe because of it: he takes care of Ashley as if she were the greatest of his treasures and I think giving that love to full hands, that love that the world always denied Ash, makes my husband's own heart continue to heal and strengthen.

The adventure of fatherhood has only made our love stronger as well and I think you understand it well now. When you put the love of the two in another person you understand that it is a feeling of unlimited magnitudes, that you can always feel more love the next day even though you thought that the previous day you had reached your limit. I feel like the ocean of Izumo, you know, I feel infinite, deep and full of waves that sing about my happiness.

And right now, when Ashley cries and Ash takes her warmly in his arms, I feel like I'm about to become a tidal wave of love. Ashley's crying does not last long because Ash speaks to her softly and even through the distance I can hear the soft voice with which he always speaks to Ashley:

"Calm down, beautiful, it's fine," he says as he rocks her in his arms. “It's okay to cry, my little girl, it's fine but dad is here with you. Dad will never leave you, Ashley, dad loves you and won't let anything hurt you. It's okay my love, it's fine. Let's not scare dad Eiji, right? Let's sing, will you? Do you want us to sing that song that Dad Eiji always sings for both of us? Dad Eiji loves you too, he loves us both. Dad Eiji is the best we both have, Ashley, and we shouldn't make him worry.”

Seriously, Yue, I'm going to melt. In truth my body will go into a liquid state from one moment to another because Ashley's crying suddenly calms down, at the same moment in which from the lips of Ash comes that sweet melody that I usually sing for the three of us when we are about of making our daughter sleep. So I get lost in the song, I will get lost in that melody right now because I know someone wrote this so that I could sing to my daughter:

_With every heartbeat I have left I will defend your every breath, and I'll do better._

_'Сause you are loved, you are loved more than you know._

_I hereby pledge all of my days to prove it so._

_Though your heart is far too young to realize the unimaginable light you hold inside._

_I'll give you everything I have. I'll teach you everything I know._

_I promise I'll do better._

_I will always hold you close but I will learn to let you go._

_I promise I'll do better._

_I will rearrange the stars, pull 'em down to where you are._

_I promise, I'll do better._

Ashley stands still and smiles again in the arms of Ash who cleans her tears calmly, with an infinite love that even I am able to feel on my skin. Ashley's smile is like an invincible rainbow after the storm and my husband's lips are also filled with light. Because Ashley's life is a miracle and maybe ours is too, just that explains we have this much love.

Anyway, Yue, I think I should leave you now. I fear that I must take the two treasures of my life in my arms right now, it cannot be otherwise. I will take them in my arms, I will kiss Ash's lips and then I will smile at Ashley and she will know that in this family, the three of us are lucky. She will always feel that, Yue. My Ashley will live surrounded by love and that will make her strong, beautiful and happy.

Come visit us soon, will you? Although my life will become chaos in the coming months because I will cover a large part of the athletic competitions of the Tokyo Olympic Games and later, I will accompany Ash in the presentation of his new novel, you know that we will always have time for friends. Bring Shorter with you, tell him it's time to stop wandering the world with his Cain though who are we to judge him? You also have to tell me how Nadia's second pregnancy is going, is it true that she and Charlie want to form a huge family composed only of beautiful and talented women? They are doing it, really. I hope Max and Jessica can also come to see us soon, I miss them a lot and it's really sweet to see Max behaving like the coolest grandfather in the universe when he's with Ashley.

As you see, Yue darling, in our story, all these stories we share with wonderful people, there will always be things to tell, to celebrate, to remember with dinners full of laughter and delicious food. We must celebrate our happiness and all this love we have achieved with years of struggle and effort, don't you think? We must celebrate our lives, Yue, our lives and our families. Because we deserve it, because I know we will never stop fighting or loving. Let's treasure our springs and never forget them, will you? I adore you, Yue, send hugs and kisses to Sing and Wang too.

With love, Eiji

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song Ash is singing is "Light" by Sleeping at last.  
> The next chapter in this story will be the last one. I´m both happy and sad but I really appreciate the fact that you were with me during these months. We´ll read you soon in the last chapter! :D  
> BTW! I´ve started a new story called "King of my heart". It is available on my profile so if you feel like it, give it a try ;D


	64. From the memoir´s book of Aslan Jade Callenreese

**  
From the memoir´s book of Aslan Jade Callenreese.**

**Published to commemorate his tenth anniversary of death.**

**December 14**

Ashley has called Eiji and me “dad” for the first time today. I was holding her in my arms while we both were looking at Eiji placing the ornaments of the huge artificial pine that my husband placed in the middle of the room of our house in Izumo. Although in Japan Christmas is not an official holiday, Eiji has always had a certain attachment to American celebrations. Just look at his enthusiasm with each Halloween, for example. This year he had the nerve to disguise Ashley as a pumpkin, which unleashed the first marriage fight of our lives.

However, Christmas is different and Ashley and I laughed because we felt happy, it's something we can't help feeling when Eiji is in a room with us. My daughter was excited because seeing Dad Okumura singing Christmas carols while placing a lot of colored spheres on the tree branches was a complete spectacle. Eiji's enthusiasm was contagious, I think that more than the Christmas spirit, it was Eiji's joy that illuminated the entire house.

That's what Ashley must have felt because my little girl was still babbling happily pointing at her father as if she wanted to do the same thing Eiji did. Perhaps in her eagerness to be close to him, our daughter said the magic word guided by all the love in her little heart. Yes, I know that Ashley loves us, since the social worker of a nursery in New York put her in my arms I have not given my daughter anything but love.

And I felt that my chest was full of that feeling when I heard her call me that: Dad.

In one word all the poetry of the universe can fit, isn't it? A single word made me smile the whole afternoon between cups of hot chocolate, gingerbread cookies and Christmas lights. A single word has altered my universe again and I can't help wondering: am I really a good father? Will my Ashley be happy? I don't know, I don't have the answer for any of those questions but I am sure I will never stop trying. Eiji always says that I worry more than I would but I can't help it.

I want Ashley to be happy, to have a childhood she wouldn't be afraid of. I want my daughter to grow up free, cheerful and strong enough to face a world that will always seek to harm us. I want Ashley to be the woman she herself decides to be without anyone filling her with wounds. Yes, I know that some wounds will be inevitable but it is my dream to keep my daughter safe and loved, at least until Eiji and I have to teach her to fly.

There is no doubt that the holidays make me sentimental but this is one of those moments with which the albums of memories are composed and there are so many things that I do not want to forget. This is one of them. Ashley called me dad today and I think this is the second happiest day of my life because the first, naturally, was the day I met my Eiji Okumura-Callenreese.

🌸🌸🌸

**March 6**

I surprised Eiji and Ashley having an important conversation in the dining room today. Eiji had prepared a huge welcome dinner because it had been a week since I had been in New York. From time to time, Max calls me to offer master classes at the University and this time I also attended an international literature conference for five days.

The truth is that I longed to get home from the first day I passed away from Izumo. On such a trip, I found myself missing the owners of my heart with each day that I spend away from them. It was difficult to be able to call them on the phone due to the time difference and now that Ashley goes to elementary school every day, I did not want to steal sleep hours just because of my own weakness, and I also did not want Eiji to sleep badly because of me but it is true that my beloved called me every day without missing, in the same way he used to call me before I fell asleep in those times when I fell more and more in love with him despite my own fear.

"I can't let a day go by without telling you that I love you, that I miss you and that I already want to see you ..." he told me, his sleepy voice made me want to be able to teleport to Japan through the telephone line.

"It's been a day since I'm not close to you and I already feel like a year has passed. Why did you let me come, Eiji?"

"Because it makes you happy, you love teaching," he said and I could almost see him smiling at me in that adorable way that the years have not changed at all.

“I love you more than teaching.”

"Yes, well, but I can share you with literature, you know?" My Aslan has much to teach the young generations of writers who admire him.”

"Your Aslan wants his husband to be here with him."

"Next time Ashley and I will go with you, I promise."

“How is our little girl?”

“She misses you but she's fine. Ashley has asked me to tell you that you should send her a video. She wants to see you, but she understood everything when I explained why we couldn't accompany you to this year's seminar.”

"Of course I will. I'm glad she understood. Hey, my love, do you think we're doing well?”

“What thing?”

“Being parents.”

"Ashley is happy, that's all that matters to us, value judgments will be given to us by the world, don't you think?" Although I can tell you that you are the best dad in the universe. Don't worry, my Aslan, you still don't believe me when I tell you there is nothing you can't do without total perfection.”

“You´re exaggerating.”

"You love me that way."

"So I will love you forever ..."

"Always ..." he said in the middle of a yawn.

"Go to sleep, Prince Okumura," I said making him laugh. “When I arrive in Japan I will wake you up with a kiss of true love.”

"Just a kiss?" He asked me with a hint of mischief that made me curse the distance.

“The best kiss of your life and that will only be the beginning.”

"Come soon, Mr. Callenreese," he said, laughing happily. “I love you, Aslan, leave them all with their mouths open in your presentation tomorrow, will you?”

"I love you, Eiji. I will arrive soon, I promise.”

After that, I finished the call and kept smiling at the ceiling of my hotel room as an idiot for at least five minutes in a row. Eiji has that effect on me and thousands of miles away cannot make any kind of difference about it.

That was why I longed to return home with such force. In my arms, I had a lot of presents that Max and Jessica had sent for Ashley who will turn ten next week. I wanted to announce my arrival to Eiji and my daughter from the first moment I crossed the door but I think I held back in time and decided to surprise them because thanks to Max's perfect organization, I had been able to finish the presentations one day before expected.

At first, I thought the house was empty until I heard the rumor of a couple of laughs in the dining room. Without making much noise, I approached the door of that room where the aroma of delicious Japanese food was already floating in the room. I smiled when I imagine that Ashley had helped Eiji to cook and it seems that it is true that cooking talent is something that is inherited in the Okumura family from generation to generation.

Ashley and Eiji were sitting in the dining room and I couldn't help getting excited when I saw that the two of them were looking at the photo album of our wedding that now contains, in addition, all the baby photos of Ashley that at this point in our story are not few. My little girl laughed with all the things Eiji told her about her uncles Yut-Lung and Shorter. Ashley looked at the images and asked questions with a sincere interest that made me sigh. My daughter is curious by nature and always smiles when someone tells her a good story.

"When did you know that Dad Aslan was your prince?" She asked cheerfully and I couldn't help smiling with a certain curiosity of my own. I really love when Eiji talks about me.

"When I looked into his eyes for the first time," my husband said with a look full of love.

“Really? Can you know something like that just by looking someone in the eye?” Ashley asked excitedly.

“When it is the one for you, of course you can. I knew that I would love your dad with all my heart since the first time I could talk to him directly.”

“And how do you know that a person is the one for you?”

"Because in his eyes you can see all the stars of the universe, all the flowers of spring. I think it's not about knowing, Ashley, you just feel it in your heart. You feel that everything has stopped being as it was before and you are not afraid that nothing will be the same. And I also knew that I would love your dad forever when I had him in my arms for the first time.”

“And dad? When did Dad know that you would be his prince?” My daughter asked taking Eiji's hand tightly.

"I knew from the first time I looked at him walking through the gardens of the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of New York," I said making a pair of green eyes and another pair of dark eyes give me the most surprised look in the universe. “Since that day I did not stop talking about your dad for a single day and what do you think, Ashley?”

"What?" My daughter replied with emotion, unable to decide whether to run into my arms or wait for Eiji to start the race to me first.

"That I will never stop talking about him. I married the prince of my dreams and that prince and my little princess are taking too long to hug me, don't you think?”

The two laughed happily at my words and ran into my arms without waiting another second. Eiji kissed my lips sweetly and I returned the kiss with enthusiasm as if I wanted to promise that I would later reward him for all those nights we had had to sleep away from each other's arms. Afterwards, we continued to show Ashley the photographs of our history together and we had a really pleasant afternoon. Blossoming of cherry trees is forecasted for the following week so I am happy to have returned to Japan again before the flower festival.

I do not stop loving spring, I think that my heart awaits the start of a new season with each passing year although I know well, that since I met Eiji, the true spring lives inside me.

I am a lucky man. I am a beloved man. I am still surprised to be, but if I stopped surprising myself of all the beautiful things in my life, I would undoubtedly be dead. And I want to live, I want to continue adding more photographs to our history. Something tells me that love stories like ours don't have and will never have an end.

That's it. Eiji and I will never have an end.

🌸🌸🌸

**August 24**

We sent Ashley to the University today. Naturally, our daughter chose to study in New York, at the Faculty of Fine Arts. My Ashley will be a photographer like Eiji and will study in the same place where I and her father met. In addition, Kaori Okumura is the director of the faculty since Max retired two years ago, which guarantees that Ashley will not be entirely alone in the Big Apple.

 

I can't help my heart to fill with pride in thinking about that, in the way in which the passion for telling stories with images was developing in her, perhaps, since her 12th birthday when Eiji gave her a professional camera.

I say that my heart feels full of pride but I am also somewhat hurt. Although Eiji and I have educated Ashley an independent and confident girl, I can't stop worrying. I think that as has happened to most parents throughout the history of the world, it is difficult to see that the children you raised suddenly become beings with their own dreams, beings that open the wings you built them and leave the nest to look for their own heaven.

Saying goodbye to my daughter at the airport was sad, of course, although we didn't let her go to the United States alone. Ashley will live in an apartment located in one of the condos of the good uncle Yut-Lung near the University. Cousin Wang-Lung, who is studying in law school, will live right next door. No, I'm not naive enough to pretend that I didn't notice the way Yut-Lung Lee's filthy handsome son sees my little girl. I know that these two children have something and although I almost declare war on his majesty, Eiji avoided the catastrophe.

"They're smart guys, Ash, they won't hurt themselves. They love each other with all their hearts and have always protected each other,” my husband said calmly.

"Besides, Aslan, you won't find a better game for Ashley than my son even if you look thousands of miles around," Yut-Lung said with his always annoying superiority. The man was making us one of his kind courtesy visits before sending Ashley to New York. “And I won't let Wang be a jerk with her, believe me, I'd disinherit him before he did something wrong to our Ashley.”

"I think we're getting ahead of the events at least ten years," I said without being able to deny that there has always been a special affection between Wang and Ashley and that the record of that fact didn't allow me to sleep very well some nights.

"Then stop worrying, if something will happen between the two, it will just happen," said Eiji, hugging me from behind. “And stop frowning like that, you will get wrinkles.”

“More?” Yut-Lung asked, showing off his always smooth skin on my face. “I have always said that Americans age horribly. You should start considering Botox, Aslan, I won't let you go on our children's wedding album if you keep getting wrinkled like this.”

"Remind me why I'm still your friend, Yut-Lung Lee.”

“Friends? Bah! You're giving yourself too much credit, Aslan.”

"Yue" Eiji said, unable to avoid laughing at my always silly fights with Yut-Lung. “Yes you are friends.”

"Only because you force us, honey ..." said his majesty winking at me. “Well, are you going on a cruise with me once the kids are in college? We could all use a vacation as single marriages once again and Sing has made room on his agenda to give me a spectacular birthday gift.”

"We plan to stay here," Eiji said as he kissed my cheek. “There is nothing like home, Yue.”

"Said the most boring marriage on the planet. Seriously, why haven't you divorced all this time? You are like a pair of grannies.”

 

"You'll always be older than me, your highness," I said, making Yue glare at me.

"I really don't understand how I haven't poisoned you all this time ..."

"Yue ..." Eiji intervened once more. “Seriously, will you ever stop fighting?”

“No!” said Mr. Lee and I in unison.

Faced with our stubbornness that has only accentuated over the years, Eiji burst out laughing and Yue and I joined his laughter. What can I say? The truth is that I like Yue a little but I will never admit it out loud, not even to Eiji. This will undoubtedly be the best kept secret of my life. After my faithful comrade, Shorter Wong who is still in his eternal travel adventure next to his tireless Cain, Yue is the closest I have to a second best friend.

Anyway, I will miss my Ashley with every fiber of my soul but I am confident that my daughter, the daughter I have raised with love all these years, will make her life something beautiful. And if one day I have to walk with her down a hallway to the altar where Yut-Lung Lee's son will be waiting for her, what can I do? Love is a mystery and I am nobody to not allow Ashley to discover his own. Wang is a good boy after all (and we should thank that to Sing) so maybe I really should stop worrying.

I think that Eiji and I will create a new spring in the fall of our lives. And that excites me because I know that he and I are going to find many ways to continue blooming even if the years and wrinkles on our face continue to accumulate for both of us.

🌸🌸🌸

**April 15**

I think that Eiji and I were the last ones to leave the dance floor.

Eiji's body and mine continued to rock in the middle of the loneliness of the huge Japanese garden where Yut-Lung Lee planned the second best wedding of his life. After all, it was the wedding of his only son who joined his life to that of my only daughter. For the second time in my life I was forced to relate to the Lee clan. The tragedy of that story is second to none.

The drama aside, it was all a beautiful ceremony. Ashley looked beautiful in her white dress covered with a thousand bright pearls that gave her the air of a real princess. Unlike my own wedding, I couldn't stop the tears from sliding down my face when I saw my little girl turned into a woman full of love and thousands of dreams to fulfill, right there in front of me. She was a recent graduate of the school of photography joining her life to one of the most recognized human rights lawyers, who was also her best friend and that man she loved with all her heart.

The girl I have loved from the first moment I had her in my arms, was smiling radiantly and her long blond hair fell into a cascade of loops down her back. I think that parents are always somewhat partial when talking about our children, however, everyone could see in Ashley an incomparable beauty, the beauty of those who have discovered an endless love in this finite world. Eiji and I walked to the altar with her and seeing her green eyes fill with light as she contemplated her handsome husband's face, I remembered the moment Eiji walked towards me to join her life to mine.

Weddings make me cheesy, that's a fact. And this wedding, where my daughter was the brightest star had me crying throughout the ceremony because I know that Ashley and Wang have inherited from the family the ability to love without limits with which their parents have raised them. I know that Ashley will have her own spring now and what else a father could wish for but the happiness of her children.

That is why, after saying goodbye to Ashley and Wang from their wedding party, since the two will travel to Europe as a honeymoon, Eiji and I stayed in the middle of the dance floor spinning like two stars drifting from the lack of gravity. Everyone was gone, there were only the last waiters collecting glass plates and cups around us and the string set that Yut-Lung had given the order to play until Eiji and I wanted to leave the track of dance.

All right, all right: I can already accept that Yut-Lung Lee is my friend and right now he is more part of my family than ever. Even Shorter told me that I am changing him for Yue to which I replied that it is not my fault that he and Cain have never wanted children. The story would have been very different if Ashley's husband was the son Shorter never wanted to have and my friend told me, quite rightly, by the way, that his happiness was not in something like that, so he simply decided to stop bothering me.

Returning to the dance floor where Eiji and I also celebrated our twenty-fifth wedding anniversary, it was beautiful to have that private party that nobody had to be involved with, just the two of us. As it was from the beginning of our history, Eiji and I only needed the closeness of our bodies to be able to celebrate that encounter that had transformed our lives forever leading us to share an existence of happy memories like the ones we had just done that afternoon.

My Eiji´s arms remain my favorite place in the universe and I think they will be until I have to leave this world. There are times when I think that the time to say goodbye to life is no longer so far for me. It is true that we human beings tend to forget our own mortality but I know that one day I will leave, I know that one day I will no longer be able to see my Eiji's beloved face once again. However, every day I beg to have one more day, just one more day by his side so I can lose myself in his eyes, in the warmth of his skin that I now know by heart, I know him in my dreams, I know him without fearing the end.

That is why I clung tightly to my husband's body while one of our favorite songs kept repeating itself in the solitude of that room that had been the place where we had both celebrated the love of a new generation. There, with our dance steps that were more of a sway without direction or order, we both wished with our eyes closed that ours would always remain inscribed in space as a promise of a better world. That's why we drew circles, symbols of infinity, symbols of that love that the soft voice of a singer was singing for both of us:

_I've waited a hundred years but I'd wait a million more for you._

_Nothing prepared me for what the privilege of being yours would do._

_If I had only felt the warmth within your touch._

_If I had only seen how you smile when you blush._

_Or how you curl your lip when you concentrate enough._

_Well I would have known what I was living for all along_

_What I've been living for…_

_Your love is my turning page where only the sweetest words remain_

_Every kiss is a cursive line, every touch is a redefining phrase._

"Sometimes I wonder what would have happened to me if I hadn't met you..." Eiji told me in the middle of a whisper.

"I'd already be dead, surely ..." I replied without hesitating for a single second.

"Me too ..." my husband whispered and let go of my hug just to cradle my face in his hands and look into my eyes with love. “I can never thank the universe enough for letting myself be the man you love.”

"Neither can I, Eiji. I really still wake up thinking that your love is a dream, that one day I will wake up and continue to live the same nightmare as always and yet you are there in each awakening. You are my miracle, Eiji,”

"You are my forever, Aslan ..."

“And what will happen after our end?”

"We won't have an end ..."

“Are you sure? Everything that is born in this world must have an end.”

“Do you want to be the exception to the rule with me, Ash? We will be like the light of the stars or as one of our many springs: it will seem that everything ends and yet we will return once again, always more fragrant, always stronger, always full of beauty.”

“Why do you still not want to write a book?”

"Because you make them better."

"You are my masterpiece.”

“And you’re mine.”

“Forever?”

“And always.”

"Happy anniversary, Eiji."

"Happy anniversary, my Aslan."

After that exchange there was no need to say more, we kissed in silence and continued dancing a little more. I like it when Eiji talks about eternity because he talks about it without fear, as if he was already enrolled in it and I think that's the case when you really love someone. Perhaps every act of love is a particle of that enormous infinity that nobody really understands. Perhaps each of the kisses that Eiji and I have shared was building a world without end for both of us. Or maybe if none of our dreams come true, we will be stardust again at the end of everything and nothing else. However, even if I become a pile of particles of material I know that my atoms would join those of Eiji because I swore to meet him once and a thousand times in eternity and I will not break that promise.

I know that Eiji and I will fill this world with springs and if the universe forgets what that is at the end of everything, I know that my beloved and I will invent something new, we will create it out of love and hope. Because whatever happens, Eiji and I are love and love means no death, no end, no goodbye.

 

🌸NEVERENDING🌸

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No, it has no end. I have reached the last chapter of this story and I can only thank you infinitely for your presence here with me. I would like to write you a full-fledged love letter but right now I am not very consistent, but really, thank you so much for giving this story a chance. It makes me very happy that you have shared it with me. I would love to read your comments about it, don't be shy, it's always great to read them. So now I'm going to cry and well, the last song these two dance is "Turning page" by Sleeping at last.
> 
> THANK YOU A LOT FOR READING <3


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